A-S 


OLe-MflMMY'S- 
TORM6NT- 

HNNIE-FELLOW5-JOHNSTOK' 


COSY  CORNER  SERIES 


University  of  California  •  Berkeley 


• 


OLE   MAMMY'S  TORMENT 


Works  of 

Annie  Fellows  Johnston 


Little  Colonel  .... 

Big  Brother 

Ole  Mammy's  Torment 

.9 

L.  C.  PAGE  AND  COMPANY,  Publishers 

(INCORPORATED) 
196  Summer  St.,  Boston,  Mass. 


OLE  MAMMY'S  TORMENT 


BY 

ANNIE  FELLOWS  JOHNSTON 


Ellusttateti  fog 
MARY   G.  JOHNSTON 

AND 

AMY   M.  SACKER 


BOSTON 
L.  C.  PAGE   AND   COMPANY 

(INCORPORATED) 

1897 


Copyright,  1897 

BY  L.  C.  PAGE  AND  COMPANY 
(INCORPORATED) 


Colonial 

Electrotyped  and  Printed  by  C.  H.  Simonds  &  Co. 
Boston,  Mass.,  U.  S.  A. 


TO 
TWO    TORMENTS    WHOM   I   KNOW 


BUD  AND  IVY Frontispiec 

JOHN  JAY 

"'  WOT  WE  ALL  GWINE  DO  NOW?'"  .... 

MARS'  NAT 

"A  GROUP  OF  PRETTY  GIRLS  SAT  ON  THE  PORCH"  . 

"FILLED  BOTH  HIS  HANDS" 

UNDER  THE  APPLE-TREE 52 

UNCLE  BILLY 65 

"THE  GANDERS  HAD  CHASED  HIM  AROUND"  .  .  76 
"GEORGE  CAME  OUT  AND  LOCKED  THE  DOOR".  .  93 
"SAT  ALONE  BY  THE  CHURCH  STEPS  "  .  .  .Ill 


OLE  MAMMY'S  TORMENT. 


CHAPTER    I. 

UNCLE  BILLY  rested  his  axe  on  the  log  he 
was  chopping,  and  turned  his  grizzly  old  head 
to  one  side,  listening  intently.  A  confusion  of 
sounds  came  from  the  little  cabin  across  the 
road.  It  was  a  dilapidated  negro  cabin,  with 
its  roof  awry  and  the  weather-boarding  off  in 
great  patches ;  still,  it  was  a  place  of  interest 
to  Uncle  Billy.  His  sister  lived  there  with 
three  orphan  grandchildren. 

Leaning  heavily  on  his  axe-handle,  he  thrust 
out  his  under  lip,  and  rolled  his  eyes  in  the 
direction  of  the  uproar.  A  broad  grin  spread 
over  his  wrinkled  black  face  as  he  heard  the 
rapid  spank  of  a  shingle,  the  scolding  tones  of 
an  angry  voice,  and  a  prolonged  howl. 


OLE    MAMMY  S    TORMENT. 


"John  Jay  an'  he  gran'mammy  'peah  to  be 
havin'  a  right  sma't  difference  of  opinion  to- 
gethah  this  mawnin',"  he  chuckled. 

He  shaded  his  eyes  with  his  stiff,  crooked 
fingers  for  a  better  view.  A  pair  of  nimble 
black  legs  skipped  back  and  forth  across  the 
open  doorway,  in  a  vain  attempt  to  dodge  the 

descending  shingle, 
while  a  clatter  of  falling 
tinware  followed  old 
Mammy's  portly  figure, 
as  she  made  awkward 
but  surprising  turns  in 
her  wrathful  circuit  of 
the  crowded  room. 

"  Ow  !  I'll  be  good  ! 
I'll  be  good!  Oh, 
Mammy,  don't !  You'se  a-killin'  me  !  "  came  in 
a  high  shriek. 

Then  there  was  a  sudden  dash  for  the  cabin 
door,  and  an  eight-year-old  colored  boy  scurried 
down  the  path  like  a  little  wild  rabbit,  as  fast  as 
his  bare  feet  could  carry  him.  The  noise  ended 
as  suddenly  as  it  had  begun  ;  so  suddenly,  in- 
deed, that  the  silence  seemed  intense,  although 
the  air  was  full  of  all  the  low  twitterings  and 


OLE    MAMMY  S    TORMENT.  3 

soft  spring  sounds  that  come  with  the  early 
days  of  April. 

Uncle  Billy  stood  chuckling  over  the  boy's 
escape.  The  situation  had  been  made  clear  to 
him  by  the  angry  exclamations  he  had  just  over- 
heard. John  Jay,  left  in  charge  of  the  weekly 
washing,  flapping  on  the  line,  had  been  unfaith- 
ful to  his  trust.  A  neighbor's  goat  had  taken 
advantage  of  his  absence  to  chew  up  a  pillow- 
case and  two  aprons. 

Really,  the  child  was  not  so  much  to  blame. 
It  was  the  fault  of  the  fish-pond,  sparkling 
below  the  hill.  But  old  Mammy  couldn't 
understand  that.  She  had  never  been  a  boy, 
with  the  water  tempting  her  to  come  and  angle 
for  its  shining  minnows  ;  with  the  budding  wil- 
lows beckoning  her,  and  the  warm  winds  luring 
her  on.  But  Uncle  Billy  understood,  and  felt 
with  a  sympathetic  tingle  in  every  rheumatic 
old  joint,  that  it  was  a  temptation  beyond  the 
strength  of  any  boy  living  to  resist. 

His  chuckling  suddenly  stopped  as  the  old 
woman  appeared  in  the  doorway.  He  fell  to 
chopping  again  with  such  vigor  that  the  chips 
flew  wildly  in  all  directions.  He  knew  from 
the  way  that  her  broad  feet  slapped  along  the 


4  OLE    MAMMY  S    TORMENT. 

beaten  path  that  she  was  still  angry,  and  he 
thought  it  safest  to  take  no  notice  of  her,  be- 
yond a  cheery  "  Good  mawnin',  sis'  Sheba." 

"  Huh  !  Not  much  good  about  it  that  I  can 
see ! "  was  her  gloomy  reply.  Lowering  the 
basket  she  carried  from  her  head  to  a  fence- 
post,  she  began  the  story  of  her  grievances. 
It  was  an  old  story  to  Uncle  Billy,  somewhat 
on  the  order  of  "The  house  that  Jack  built;" 
for,  after  telling  John  Jay's  latest  pranks,  she 
always  repeated  the  long  line  of  misdeeds  of 
which  he  had  been  guilty  since  the  first  day  he 
had  found  a  home  under  her  sagging  rooftree. 

Usually  she  found  a  sympathetic  listener  in 
Uncle  Billy,  but  this  morning  the  only  comfort 
he  offered  was  an  old  plantation  proverb,  spoken 
with  brotherly  frankness. 

"  Well,  sis'  Sheba,  I  'low  it'll  be  good  for  you 
in  the  long  run.  <  Troubles  is  seasonin'.  'Sim- 
mons ain't  good  twel  dey  er  fros'bit,'  you  know." 

He  stole  a  sidelong  glance  at  her  from  under 
his  bushy  eyebrows,  to  see  the  effect  of  his 
remark.  She  tossed  her  head  defiantly.  "  I 
'low  if  the  choice  was  left  to  the  'simmon  or 
you  eithah,  brer  Billy,  you'd  both  take  the 
greenness  an'  the  puckah  befo'  the  fros'bite 


OLE    MAMMY  S    TORMENT.  5 

every  time."  Then  a  tone  of  complaint  trem- 
bled in  her  voice. 

"  I  might  a  needed  chastenin'  in  my  youth, 
I  don't  'spute  that ;  but  why  should  I  now,  a 
trim'lin'  on  the  aidge  of  the  tomb,  almos', 
have  to  put  up  with  that  limb  of  a  John  Jay  ? 
If  my  poah  Ellen  knew  what  a  tawment  her 
boy  is  to  her  ole  mammy,  I  know  she  couldn't 
rest  easy  in  her  grave." 

"John  Jay,  he  don't  mean  to  be  bad,"  re- 
marked Uncle  Billy  soothingly.  "It's  jus' 
'cause  he's  so  young  an'  onthinkin'.  An'  aftah 
all,  it  ain't  what  he  does.  It's  mo'  like  what 
the  white  folks  say  in  they  church  up  on  the 
hill.  '  I  have  lef  undone  the  things  what  I 
ought  to  'uv  done.' ' 

Doubled  up  out  of  sight,  behind  the  bushes 
that  lined  the  roadside  ditch,  John  Jay  held  his 
breath  and  listened.  When  the  ringing  strokes 
of  the  axe  began  again,  he  ventured  to  poke  out 
his  woolly  head  until  the  whites  of  his  eyes 
were  visible.  Sheba  was  trudging  down  the 
road  with  her  basket  on  her  head,  to  the  place 
where  she  always  washed  on  Tuesdays.  She 
was  far  enough  on  her  way  now  to  make  it 
safe  for  him  to  come  out  of  hiding. 


0  OLE    MAMMY  S    TORMENT. 

The  tears  had  dried  on  the  boy's  long  curling 
lashes,  but  his  bare  legs  still  smarted  from  the 
blows  of  the  shingle,  as  he  climbed  slowly  out 
of  the  bushes  and  started  back  to  the  cabin. 

"  Hey,  Bud !  Come  on,  Ivy ! "  he  called 
cheerfully.  Nobody  answered.  It  was  a  part 
of  the  programme,  whenever  John  Jay  was 
punished,  for  the  little  brother  and  sister  to 
run  and  hide  under  the  back-door  step.  There 
they  cowered,  with  covered  heads,  until  the  dan- 
ger was  over.  Old  Sheba  had  never  frowned 
on  the  four-year-old  Bud,  or  baby  Ivy,  but 
they  scuttled  out  of  sight  like  frightened  mice 
at  the  first  signal  of  her  gathering  wrath. 

Ivy  lay  still  with  her  thumb  in  her  mouth, 
but  Bud  began  solemnly  crawling  out  from  be- 
tween the  steps.  Everything  that  Bud  did 
seemed  solemn.  Even  his  smiles  were  slow- 
spreading  and  dignified.  Some  people  called 
him  Judge ;  but  John  Jay,  wise  in  the  negro 
lore  of  their  neighborhood  Uncle  Remus, 
called  him  "  Brer  Tarrypin  "  for  good  reasons 
of  his  own. 

"Wot  we  all  gwine  do  now?"  drawled  Bud, 
with  a  turtle-like  stretch  of  his  little  round  head 
as  he  peered  through  the  steps. 


OLE    MAMMY  S    TORMENT.  7 

John  Jay  scanned  the  horizon  on  all  sides, 
and  thoughtfully  rubbed  his  ear.  His  quick 
eyes  saw  unlimited  possibilities  for  enjoyment, 
where  older  sight  would  have  found  but  a  dreary 


outlook  ;  but  older  sight  is  always  on  a  strain 
for  the  birds  in  the  bush.  It  is  never  satisfied 
with  the  one  in  the  hand.  Older  sight  would 
have  seen  only  a  poor  shanty  set  in  a  patch  of 


8 


weeds  and  briers,  and  a  narrow  path  straggling 
down  to  the  dust  of  the  public  road.  But  the 
outlook  was  satisfactory  to  John  Jay.  So  was 
it  to  the  neighbor's  goat,  standing  motionless 
in  the  warm  sunshine,  with  its  eyes  cast  in  the 
direction  of  a  newly-made  garden.  So  was  it 
to  the  brood  of  little  yellow  goslings,  waddling 
after  their  mother.  They  were  out  of  their 
shells,  and  the  world  was  wide. 

Added  to  this  same  feeling  of  general  con- 
tentment  with  his  lot,  John  Jay  had  the  peace 
that  came  from  the  certainty  that,  no  matter 
what  he  might  do,  punishment  could  not  possibly 
overtake  him  before  nightfall.  His  grandmother 
was  always  late  coming  home  on  Tuesday. 

"Wot  we  all  gwine  do  now?"  repeated  Bud. 

John  Jay  caught  at  the  low  branch  of  the 
apple-tree  to  which  the  clothes-line  was  tied, 
and  drew  himself  slowly  up.  He  did  not  reply 
until  he  had  turned  himself  over  the  limb  several 
times,  and  hung  head  downward  by  the  knees. 

"  Go  snake  huntin',  I  reckon." 

"But  Mammy  said  not  to  take  Ivy  in  the 
briah-patch  again,"  said  Bud  solemnly. 

"  That's  so,"  exclaimed  John  Jay,  "  an'  shingle 
say  so  too,"  he  added,  with  a  grin,  for  his  legs 


OLE    MAMMY  S    TORMENT.  9 

still  smarted.  Loosening  the  grip  of  his  knees  on 
the  apple-bough,  he  turned  a  summersault  back- 
ward and  landed  on  his  feet  as  lightly  as  a  cat. 

"  Ivy'll  go  to  sleep  aftah  dinnah,"  suggested 
Bud.  "  She  always  do."  It  seemed  a  long  time 
to  wait  until  then,  but  with  the  remembrance  of 
his  last  punishment  still  warm  in  mind  and 
body,  John  Jay  knew  better  than  to  take  his 
little  sister  to  the  forbidden  briar-patch. 

"  Well,  we  can  dig  a  lot  of  fishin'  worms,"  he 
decided,  "an'  put  'em  in  those  tomato  cans 
undah  the  ash-hoppah.  Then  we'll  make  us  a 
mud  oven  an'  roast  us  some  duck  aigs.  No- 
body but  me  knows  where  the  nest  is." 

Bud's  eyes  shone.  The  prospect  was  an  in- 
viting one. 

Most  of  the  morning  passed  quickly,  but  the 
last  half-hour  was  spent  in  impatiently  waiting 
for  their  dinner.  They  knew  it  was  spread  out 
under  a  newspaper  on  the  rickety  old  table,  but 
they  had  strict  orders  not  to  touch  it  until  Aunt 
Susan  sounded  her  signal  for  Uncle  Billy.  So 
they  sat  watching  the  house  across  the  road. 

"  Now  it's  time  !  "  cried  Bud  excitedly.  "  I 
see  Aunt  Susan  goin'  around  the  end  of  the 
house  with  her  spoon." 


IO  OLE    MAMMY  S    TORMENT. 

An  old  cross-cut  saw  hung  by  one  handle 
from  a  peg  in  the  stick  chimney.  As  she  beat 
upon  it  now  with  a  long,  rusty  iron  spoon,  the 
din  that  filled  the  surrounding  air  was  worse 
than  any  made  by  the  noisiest  gong  ever  beaten 
before  a  railroad  restaurant.  Uncle  Billy,  hoe- 
ing in  a  distant  field,  gave  an  answering  whoop, 
and  waved  his  old  hat. 

The  children  raced  into  the  house  and  tore 
the  newspaper  from  the  table.  Under  it  were 
three  cold  boiled  potatoes,  a  dish  of  salt,  a  cup 
of  molasses,  and  a  big  pone  of  corn-bread.  As 
head  of  the  family,  John  Jay  divided  everything 
but  the  salt  exactly  into  thirds,  and  wasted  no 
time  in  ceremonies  before  beginning.  As  soon 
as  the  last  crumb  was  finished  he  spread  an  old 
quilt  in  front  of  the  fireplace,  where  the  embers, 
though  covered  deep  in  ashes,  still  kept  the 
hearth  warm. 

No  coaxing  was  needed  to  induce  Ivy  to  lie 
down.  Even  if  she  had  not  been  tired  and 
sleepy  she  would  have  obeyed.  John  Jay's 
word  was  law  in  his  grandmother's  absence. 
Then  he  sat  down  on  the  doorstep  and  waited 
for  her  to  go  to  sleep. 

"  If  she  wakes  up  and  gets  out  on  the  road 


OLE    MAMMY  S    TORMENT.  II 

while  we're  gone,  won't  I  catch  it,  though  !  " 
he  exclaimed  to  Bud  in  an  undertone. 

"  Shet  the  doah,"  suggested  Bud. 

"  No,  she'd  sut'n'ly  get  into  some  devilmint 
if  she  was  shet  in  by  herself,"  he  answered. 

"  How  oft  the  sight  of  means  to  do  ill  deeds 
makes  ill  deeds  done  !  "  John  Jay's  roving  eyes 
fell  on  a  broken  teacup  on  the  window-sill,  that 
Mammy  kept  as  a  catch-all  for  stray  buttons 
and  bits  of  twine.  He  remembered  having 
seen  some  rusty  tacks  among  the  odds  and 
ends.  A  loose  brickbat  stuck  up  suggestively 
from  the  sunken  hearth.  The  idea  had  not 
much  sooner  popped  into  his  head  than  the 
deed  was  done.  Bending  over  breathlessly  to 
make  sure  that  the  unsuspecting  Ivy  was 
asleep,  he  nailed  her  little  pink  dress  to  the 
floor  with  a  row  of  rusty  tacks.  Then  cau- 
tiously replacing  the  bit  of  broken  brick,  he 
made  for  the  door,  upsetting  Bud  in  his  hasty 
leave-taking. 

Over  in  the  briar-patch,  out  of  sight  of  the 
house,  two  happy  little  darkeys  played  all  the 
afternoon.  They  beat  the  ground  with  the  stout 
clubs  they  carried.  They  pried  up  logs  in 
search  of  snakes.  They  whooped,  they  sang, 


12  OLE    MAMMY  S    TORMENT. 

they  whistled.  They  rolled  over  and  over  each 
other,  giggling  as  they  wrestled,  in  the  sheer 
delight  of  being  alive  on  such  a  day.  When 
they  finally  killed  a  harmless  little  chicken- 
snake,  no  prince  of  the  royal  blood,  hunting 
tigers  in  Indian  jungles,  could  have  been 
prouder  of  his  striped  trophies  than  they  were 
of  theirs. 

Meanwhile  Ivy  slept  peacefully  on,  one  little 
hand  sticking  to  her  plump,  molasses-smeared 
cheek,  the  other  holding  fast  to  her  headless 
doll.  Beside  her  on  the  floor  lay  a  tattered 
picture-book,  a  big  bottle  half  full  of  red 
shelled  corn,  and  John  Jay's  most  precious 
treasure,  a  toy  watch  that  could  be  endlessly 
wound  up.  He  had  heaped  them  all  beside  her, 
hoping  they  would  keep  her  occupied  until  his 
return,  in  case  she  should  waken  earlier  than 
usual. 

The  sun  was  well  on  its  way  to  bed  when 
the  little  hunters  shouldered  their  clubs,  with  a 
snake  dangling  from  each  one,  and  started  for 
the  cabin. 

"  My  !  I  didn't  know  it  was  so  late ! "  ex- 
claimed John  Jay  ruefully,  as  they  met  a  long 
procession  of  home-going  cows.  "Ain't  it 


OLE  MAMMY'S  TORMENT.  13 

funny  how  soon  sundown  gets  heah  when  yo' 
havin'  a  good  time,  and  how  long  it  is  a-comin' 
when  yo'  isn't !  " 

A  dusky  little  figure  rose  up  out  of  the  weeds 
ahead  of  them.  "  Land  sakes  !  Ivy  Hickman  !  " 
exclaimed  John  Jay,  dropping  his  snake  in  sur- 
prise. "  How  did  you  get  heah  ?  " 

Ivy  stuck  her  thumb  in  her  mouth  without 
answering.  He  took  her  by  the  shoulder, 
about  to  shake  a  reply  from  her,  when  Bud 
exclaimed,  in  a  frightened  voice,  "  Law,  I  see 
Mammy  comin'.  Look !  There  she  is  now,  in 
front  of  Uncle  Billy's  house !  " 

Throwing  away  his  club,  and  catching  Ivy  up 
in  his  short  arms,  John  Jay  staggered  up  the 
path  leading  to  the  back  of  the  house  as  fast  as 
such  a  heavy  load  would  allow,  leaving  Brer 
Tarrypin  far  in  the  rear.  Just  as  he  sank 
down  at  the  back  door,  all  out  of  breath,  old 
Sheba  reached  the  front  one. 

"John  Jay,"  she  called,  "what  you  doing', 
chile?" 

"  Heah  I  is,  Mammy,"  he  answered.  "  Fse 
jus'  takin'  keer  o'  the  chillun  ! " 

"That's  right,  honey,  I've  got  somethin' 
mighty  good  in  my  basket  fo'  we  all's  sup- 


14  OLE    MAMMY  S    TORMENT. 

pah.  Hurry  up  now,  an'  tote  in  some  kin'lin' 
wood." 

Never  had  John  Jay  sprung  to  obey  as  he  did 
then.  He  shivered  when  he  thought  of  his 
narrow  escape.  His  arms  were  piled  so  full  of 
wood  that  he  could  scarcely  see  over  them, 
when  he  entered  the  poorly  lighted  little 
cabin.  He  stumbled  over  the  bottle  of  corn 
and  the  picture-book.  Maybe  he  would  not 
have  kicked  them  aside  so  gaily  had  he- known 
that  his  precious  watch  was  lying  in  the  cow- 
path  on  the  side  of  the  hill  where  Ivy  had 
dropped  it. 

Mammy  was  bending  over,  examining  some- 
thing at  her  feet.  Five  ragged  strips  of  pink 
calico  lay  along  the  floor,  each  held  fast  at  one 
end  by  a  rusty  tack  driven  into  the  puncheons. 
Ivy  had  grown  tired  of  her  bondage,  and  had 
tugged  and  twisted  until  she  got  away.  The 
faithful  tacks  had  held  fast,  but  the  pink  calico, 
grown  thin  with  long  wear  and  many  washings, 
tore  in  ragged  strips.  Mammy  glanced  from 
the  floor  to  Ivy's  tattered  dress,  and  read  the 
whole  story. 

Outside,  across  the  road,  Uncle  Billy  leaned 
over  his  front  gate  in  the  deepening  twilight, 


OLE    MAMMY  S    TORMENT.  15 

and  peacefully  puffed  at  his  corn-cob  pipe.  As 
the  smoke  curled  up  he  bent  his  head  to  listen, 
as  he  had  done  in  the  early  morning.  The  day 
was  ending  as  it  had  begun,  with  the  whack  of 
old  Mammy's  shingle,  and  the  noise  of  John 
Jay's  loud  weeping. 


CHAPTER   II. 

IT  was  a  warm  night  in  May.  The  bright 
moonlight  shone  in  through  the  chinks  of  the 
little  cabin,  and  streamed  across  Ivy's  face, 
where  she  lay  asleep  on  Mammy's  big  feather 
bed.  Bud  was  gently  snoring  in  his  corner  of  the 
trundle-bed  below,  but  John  Jay  kicked  rest- 
lessly beside  him.  He  could  not  sleep  with  the 
moonlight  in  his  eyes  and  the  frogs  croaking  so 
mournfully  in  the  pond  back  of  the  house.  To 
begin  with,  it  was  too  early  to  go  to  bed,  and  in 
the  second  place  he  wasn't  a  bit  sleepy. 

Mammy  sat  on  a  bench  just  outside  of  the 
door,  with  her  elbows  on  her  knees.  She  was 
crooning  a  dismal  song  softly  to  herself, —  some- 
thing about 

"  Mary  and  Martha  in  deep  distress, 
A-grievin'  ovah  brer  Laz'rus'  death." 

It  gave  him  such  a  creepy  sort  of  feeling  that 
he  stuck  his  fingers  in  his  ears  to  shut  out  the 

16 


OLE  MAMMY'S  TORMENT.  17 

sound.  Thus  barricaded,  he  did  not  hear  slow 
footsteps  shuffling  up  the  path ;  but  presently 
the  powerful  fumes  of  a  rank  pipe  told  of  an 
approaching  visitor.  He  took  his  fingers  from 
his  ears  and  sat  up. 

Uncle  Billy  and  Aunt  Susan  had  come  over 
to  gossip  a  while.  Mammy  groped  her  way  into 
the  house  to  drag  out  the  wooden  rocker 
for  her  sister-in-law,  while  Uncle  Billy  tilted 
himself  back  against  the  cabin  in  a  straight 
splint-bottomed  chair.  The  usual  opening  re- 
marks about  the  state  of  the  family  health,  the 
weather,  and  the  crops  were  of  very  little  inter- 
est to  John  Jay  ;  indeed  he  nearly  fell  asleep 
while  Aunt  Susan  was  giving  a  detailed  account 
of  the  way  she  cured  the  misery  in  her  side. 
However,  as  soon  as  they  began  to  discuss 
neighborhood  happenings,  he  was  all  atten- 
tion. 

The  more  interested  he  grew,  it  seemed  to 
him,  the  lower  they  pitched  their  voices.  Creep- 
ing carefully  across  the  floor,  he  curled  up  on 
his  pillow  just  inside  the  doorway,  where  the 
shadows  fell  heaviest,  and  where  he  could  enjoy 
every  word  of  the  conversation,  without  strain- 
ing his  ears  to  listen. 


1 8  OLE  MAMMY'S  TORMENT. 

"  Gawge  Chad  wick  came  home  yestiddy," 
announced  Uncle  Billy. 

"  Sho  now  !  "  exclaimed  Mammy.  "  Not  lame 
Jintsey's  boy  !  You  don't  mean  it  !  " 

"  That's  the  ve'y  one,"  persisted  Uncle  Billy. 
"  Gawge  Washington  Chadwick.  He's  a  min- 
istah  of  the  gospel  now,  home  from  college  with 
a  Rev'und  befo'  his  name,  an'  a  long-tailed 
black  coat  on.  He  does  n't  look  much  like  the 
little  pickaninny  that  b'long  to  Mars'  Nat  back 
in  wah  times." 

"  And  Jintsey's  dead,  poah  thing  !  "  exclaimed 
Aunt  Susan.  "  What  a  day  it  would  have  been 
for  her,  if  she  could  have  lived  to  see  her  boy 
in  the  pulpit  !  " 

Conversation  never  kept  on  a  straight  road 
when  these  three  were  together.  It  was  con- 
tinually turning  back  by  countless  by-paths  to 
the  old  slavery  days.  The  rule  of  their  master, 
Nat  Chadwick,  had  been  an  easy  one.  There 
had  always  been  plenty  in  the  smoke-house  and 
contentment  in  the  quarters.  These  simple  old 
souls,  while  rejoicing  in  their  freedom,  often 
looked  tenderly  back  to  the  flesh-pots  of  their 
early  Egypt. 

John    Jay    had    heard    these   reminiscences 


OLE    MAMMY  S    TORMENT.  19 

dozens  of  times.  He  knew  just  what  was 
coming  next,  when  Uncle  Billy  began  telling 
about  the  day  that  young  Mars'  Nat  was 
christened.  Mis'  Alice  gave  a  silver  cup  to 
Jintsey's  baby,  George  Washington,  because 
he  was  born  on  the  same  day  as  his  little 
Mars'  Nat.  John  Jay  knew  the  whole  family 
history.  He  was  very  proud  of  these  people 
of  gentle  birth  and  breeding,  whom  Sheba  spoke 
of  as  "ou'  family."  One  by  one  they  had  been 
carried  to  the  little  Episcopal  churchyard  on 
the  hill,  until  only  one  remained.  The  great 
estate  had  passed  into  the  hands  of  strangers. 
Only  to  Billy  and  Susan  and  Sheba,  faithful 
even  unto  death,  was  it  still  surrounded  by  the 
halo  of  its  old-time  grandeur. 

Naturally,  young  Nat  Chadwick,  the  last  of 
the  line,  had  fallen  heir  to  all  the  love  and  re- 
spect with  which  they  cherished  any  who  bore 
the  family  name.  To  other  people  he  was  a 
luckless  sort  of  fellow,  who  had  sown  his  wild 
oats  early,  and  met  disappointment  at  every 
turn.  It  was  passed  about,  too,  that  there  was 
a  romance  in  his  life  which  had  changed  and 
embittered  it.  Certain  it  is,  he  suddenly  seemed 
to  lose  all  ambition  and  energy.  Instead  of 


2O  OLE    MAMMY  S    TORMENT. 

making  the  brilliant  lawyer  his  friends  expected, 
he  had  come  down  at  last  to  be  the  keeper  of 
the  toll-gate  on  a  country  turnpike. 

Lying  on  his  pillow  in  the  dense  shadow, 
John  Jay  looked  out  into  the  white  moon- 
light, and  listened  to  the  old  story  told  all  over 
again.  But  this  time  there  was  added  the 
history  of  Jintsey's  boy,  who  seemed  to  have 
been  born  with  the  ambition  hot  in  his  heart 
to  win  an  education.  He  had  done  it. 
There  was  a  quiver  of  pride  in  Uncle  Billy's 
voice  as  he  told  how  the  boy  had  outstripped 
his  young  master  in  the  long  race ;  but  there 
was  a  loyal  and  tender  undercurrent  of  excuse 
for  the  unfortunate  heir  running  through  all 
his  talk. 

It  had  taken  twenty  years  of  struggle  and 
work  for  the  little  black  boy  to  realize  his 
hopes.  He  had  grown  to  be  a  grave  man  of 
thirty-three  before  it  was  accomplished.  Now 
he  had  come  home  from  a  Northern  college  with 
his  diploma  and  his  degree. 

"  He  have  fought  a  good  fight,"  said  Uncle 
Billy  in  conclusion,  finishing  as  usual  with  a 
scriptural  quotation.  "  He  have  fought  a  good 
fight,  and  he  have  finished  his  co'se,  but " 


OLE  MAMMY'S  TORMENT.  21 

here  his  voice  sank  almost  to  a  whisper  —  "  he 
have  come  home  to  die." 

A  chill  seemed  to  creep  all  over  John  Jay's 
warm  little  body.  He  raised  his  head  from  the 
pillow  to  listen  still  more  carefully. 

"  Yes,  they  say  he  got  the  gallopin'  consump- 
tion while  he  was  up  Nawth,  shovellin'  snow  an' 
such  work,  an'  studyin'  nights  in  a  room  'thout 
no  fiah.  He  took  ole  Mars's  name  an'  he  have 
brought  honah  upon  it,  but  what  good  is  it 
goin'  to  do  him  ?  Tell  me  that.  For  when  the 
leaves  go  in  the  autumn  time,  then  Jintsey's 
boy  must  go  too." 

"  Where's  he  stayin'  at  now  ? "  demanded 
Mammy  sharply,  although  she  drew  the  corner 
of  her  apron  across  her  eyes. 

"  He's  down  to  Mars'  Nat's  at  the  toll-gate 
cottage.  'Peahs  like  it's  the  natch'el  place  for 
him  to  be.  Neithah  of  'em's  got  anybody  else, 
and  it's  kind  a  like  old  times  when  they  was 
chillun,  playin'  round  the  big  house  togethah. 
I  stopped  in  to  see  him  yestiddy.  The  cup 
Mis'  Alice  gave  him  was  a-settin'  on  the  man- 
tel, an'  Mars'  Nat  was  stewin'  up  some  sawt 
of  cough  tonic  for  him.  The  white  folks  up 
Nawth  must  a  thought  a  heap  of  him.  He'd 


22  OLE    MAMMY  S    TORMENT. 

just  got  a  lettah  from  one  of  the  college  pro- 
fessahs  'quirin'  bout  his  health.  Mars'  Nat 
read  out  what  was  on  the  back  of  it  :  'Rev'und 
Gawge  W.  Chadwick,  an'  some  lettahs  on  the 
end  that  I  kain't  remembah.  An'  he  said, 
laughin'-like,  sezee,  'well,  Uncle  Billy,  you'd 
nevah  take  that  as  meanin'  Jintsey's  boy,  would 
you  now  ?  It's  a  mighty  fine  soundin'  title,' 
sezee.  Gawge  gave  a  little  moanful  sawt  of 
smile,  same  as  to  say,  well,  aftah  all,  it  wasn't 
wuth  what  it  cost  him.  An'  it  wasn't !  No,  it 
wasn't,"  repeated  Uncle  Billy,  solemnly  shaking 
the  ashes  from  his  pipe.  "  What's  the  good  of 
a  head  full  of  book  learnin'  with  a  poah  puny 
body  that  kaint  tote  it  around  ? " 

Somehow,  Uncle  Billy's  solemn  declaration, 
"  he  have  fought  a  good  fight,"  associated  this 
colored  preacher,  in  John  Jay's  simple  little 
mind,  with  soldiers  and  fierce  battles  and  a 
great  victory.  He  lay  back  on  his  pillow,  wish- 
ing they  would  go  on  talking  about  this  man 
who  had  suddenly  become  such  a  hero  in  his 
boyish  eyes.  But  their  talk  gradually  drifted  to 
the  details  of  Mrs.  Watson's  last  illness.  He 
had  heard  them  so  many  times  that  he  soon  felt 
his  eyelids  slowly  closing.  Then  he  dozed  for 


OLE    MAMMY  S    TORMENT.  23 

a  few  minutes,  awakening  with  a  start.  They 
had  gotten  as  far  as  the  funeral  now,  and  were 
discussing  the  sermon.  They  would  soon  be 
commenting  on  the  way  that  each  member  of  the 
family  "took  her  death."  That  was  so  much 
more  interesting,  he  thought  he  would  just 
close  his  eyes  again  for  a  moment,  until  they 
came  to  that. 

Their  voices  murmured  on  in  a  pleasing  flow ; 
his  head  sunk  lower  on  the  pillow,  and  his 
breathing  was  a  little  louder.  Then  his  hand 
dropped  down  at  his  side.  He  was  sound  asleep 
just  when  Aunt  Susan  was  about  to  begin  one 
of  her  most  thrilling  ghost  stories. 

In  the  midst  of  an  account  of  "  a  ha'nt  that 
walked  the  graveyard  every  thirteenth  Friday 
in  the  year,"  John  Jay  turned  over  in  his  sleep 
with  a  little  snort.  Aunt  Susan  nearly  jumped 
out  of  her  chair,  and  Uncle  Billy  dropped  his 
pipe.  There  was  a  moment  of  frightened 
silence  till  Mammy  said,  "  It  must  have  been 
Bud,  I  reckon.  John  Jay  is  allus  a-knockin' 
him  in  his  sleep  an*  makin'  him  holler  out.  Go 
on,  sis'  Susan." 

The  moon  had  travelled  well  across  the  sky 
when  Mammy's  guests  said  good  night.  She 


24  OLE    MAMMY  S    TORMENT. 

lingered  outside  after  they  had  gone,  to  look  far 
down  the  road,  where  a  single  point  of  light, 
shining  through  the  trees,  marked  the  toll-gate. 
It  would  not  be  so  lonely  for  Mars'  Nat,  now 
that  George  had  come  home.  She  recalled  the 
laughing  face  of  the  little  black  boy  as  she  had 
known  it  long  ago,  and  tried  to  call  up  in  her 
imagination  a  picture  of  the  man  that  Uncle 
Billy  had  described.  Visions  of  the  old  days 
rose  before  her.  As  she  stood  there  with  her 
hands  wrapped  in  her  apron,  it  was  not  the 
moon-flooded  night  she  looked  into,  but  the 
warm,  living  daylight  of  a  golden  past. 

At  last,  with  a  sigh,  she  turned  to  take  the 
chairs  into  the  house.  Lifting  the  big  rocker 
high  in  front  of  her,  she  stepped  over  the  thresh- 
old and  started  to  shuffle  her  way  along  to  the 
candle  shelf.  The  chair  came  down  in  the 
middle  of  the  floor  with  a  sudden  bang,  as  she 
caught  her  foot  in  John  Jay's  pillow  and 
sprawled  across  him. 

The  boy's  first  waking  thought  was  that  there 
had  been  an  earthquake  and  that  the  cabin  had 
caved  in.  He  never  could  rightly  remember 
the  order  of  events  that  followed,  but  he  had  a 
confused  memory  of  a  shriek,  a  scratching  of 


OLE    MAMMY  S    TORMENT.  25 

matches,  and  the  glimmer  of  a  candle  that  made 
him  sit  up  and  blink  his  eyes.  Then  something 
struck  him,  first  on  one  ear,  then  the  other, 
cuffing  him  soundly.  He  was  too  dazed  to 
know  why.  Some  blind  instinct  helped  him  to 
find  the  bed  and  burrow  down  under  the  clothes, 
where  he  lay  trying  to  think  what  possible  fault 
of  his  could  have  raised  such  a  cyclone  about 
his  ears.  He  was  too  deep  under  the  bed- 
clothes to  hear  Mammy's  grumbling  remarks 
about  his  "  tawmentin*  ways  "  as  she  rubbed 
her  skinned  elbow  with  tallow  from  the  candle. 


CHAPTER  III. 

STANDING  in  the  back  door  of  Sheba's  cabin, 
one  could  see  the  red  gables  of  the  old  Chad- 
wick  house,  rising  above  the  dark  pine-trees 
that  surrounded  it.  A  wealthy  city  family  by 
the  name  of  Haven  owned  it  now.  It  was  open 
only  during  the  summer  months.  The  roses  that 
Mistress  Alice  had  set  out  with  her  own  white 
hands  years  ago  climbed  all  over  the  front  of 
the  house,  twining  around  its  tall  pillars,  and 
hanging  down  in  festoons  from  its  stately  eaves. 
Cuttings  from  the  same  hardy  plant  had  been 
trained  along  the  fences,  around  the  tree-trunks 
and  over  trellises,  until  the  place  had  come  to 
be  known  all  around  the  country  as  "  Rose- 
haven." 

Sheba  always  had  steady  employment  when 
the  place  was  open,  for  the  young  ladies  of  the 
family  kept  her  flat-irons  busy  with  their  endless 
tucks  and  ruffles.  She  found  a  good  market, 
too,  for  all  the  eggs  she  could  induce  her  buff 
26 


OLE  MAMMY'S  TORMENT.  27 

cochins  to  lay,  and  all  the  berries  that  she  could 
make  John  Jay  pick. 

This  bright  June  morning  she  stood  in  the 
door  with  a  basket  of  fresh  eggs  in  her  hand, 
looking  anxiously  across  the  fields  to  the  gables 
of  Rosehaven,  and  grumbling  to  herself. 

"  Heah  I  done  promise  Miss  Hallie  these 
fresh  aigs  for  her  bufday  cake,  an'  no  way  to 
get  'em  to  her.  I'll  nevah  get^all  these  clothes 
done  up  by  night  if  I  stop  my  i'onin',  an'  John 
Jay's  done  lit  out  again  !  little  black  rascal ! " 
She  lifted  up  her  voice  in  another  wavering  call. 
"John  Ja-a-y !  "  The  beech  woods  opposite 
threw  back  the  echo  of  her  voice,  sweet  and 
clear, —  "  Ja-a-y.!  " 

"  Heah  I  come,  Mammy !  "  cried  a  panting 
voice.  "  I  was  jus'  turnin'  the  grine-stone  for 
Uncle  Billy." 

She  looked  at  him  suspiciously  an  instant, 
then  handed  him  the  basket.  "Take  these 
aigs  ovah  to  Miss  Hallie,"  she  ordered,  "and 
mind  you  be  quickah'n  you  was  last  time,  or 
they  might  hatch  befo'  you  get  there." 

"  Law  now,  Mammy !  "  said  John  Jay,  with  a 
grin.  He  snatched  at  the  basket,  impatient  to 
be  off,  for  while  standing  before  her  he  had 


28  OLE  MAMMY'S  TORMENT. 

kept  scratching  his  right  shoulder  with  his  left 
hand ;  not  that  there  was  any  need  to  do  so, 
but  it  gave  him  an  excuse  for  holding  together 
the  jagged  edges  of  a  great  tear  in  his  new 
shirt.  He  was  afraid  it  might  be  discovered 
before  he  could  get  away. 

It  was  one  of  John  Jay's  peculiarities  that  in 
going  on  an  errand  he  always  chose  the  most 
roundabout  route.  Now,  instead  of  following 
the  narrow  footpath  that  made  a  short  cut 
through  the  cool  beech  woods,  he  went  half  a 
mile  out  of  his  way,  along  the  sunny  turnpike. 

Mars'  Nat  stood  outside  his  kitchen  win- 
dow, with  his  hands  in  his  pockets,  giving 
orders  to  the  colored  boy  within,  who  did  his 
bachelor  housekeeping.  Usually  he  had  a  jok- 
ing word  for  old  Sheba's  grandson,  but  this 
morning  he  took  no  notice  of  the  little  fellow 
loitering  by  with  such  an  appealing  look  on  his 
face.  John  Jay  had  come  past  the  toll-gate 
with  a  hope  of  seeing  the  "  Rev'und  Gawge,"  as 
he  called  him.  It  had  been  three  weeks  since 
the  man  had  come  home,  and  in  that  time 
John  Jay's  interest  in  him  had  grown  into  a 
sort  of  hero-worship.  There  had  been  a  great 
deal  of  talk  about  him  among  the  ignorant  col- 


OLE    MAMMY S    TORMENT.  3! 

ored  people.  Wonderful  stories  were  afloat  of 
his  experiences  at  the  North,  of  his  power 
as  a  preacher,  and  of  the  plans  he  had  made 
to  help  his  people.  He  would  have  been 
surprised  could  he  have  known  how  he  was 
discussed,  or  how  the  stories  grew  as  they 
travelled. 

Those  who  had  any  claim  whatever  to  a  for- 
mer acquaintance  stopped  at  the  cottage  to  see 
him.  Their  interest  and  the  little  offerings  of 
fruit  or  flowers,  which  they  often  made  their 
excuse  for  coming,  touched  him  greatly.  To 
all  who  came  he  spoke  freely  of  his  hopes. 
Realizing  that  he  might  have  but  the  one  op- 
portunity, he  talked  as  only  a  man  can  talk  who 
feels  the  responsibilities  of  a  lifetime  crowded 
into  one  short  hour.  One  by  one  they  came 
and  listened,  and  went  away  with  a  new  expres- 
sion on  their  faces,  and  a  new  ambition  in  their 
hearts. 

To  all  these  people  he  was  "  Brothah  Chad- 
wick  ; "  to  the  three  old  slaves  bound  to  him 
by  ties  almost  as  strong  as  those  of  kinship,  he 
could  never  be  other  than  Jintsey's  boy  ;  but 
to  two  persons  he  was  known  as  the  "  Rev'und 
Gawge."  Mars'  Nat  took  to  calling  him  that 


32  OLE    MAMMY  S    TORMENT. 

in  a  joking  way,  but  John  Jay  gave  him  the 
title  almost  with  awe.  It  seemed  to  set  him 
apart  in  the  child's  reverent  affection  as  one 
who  had  come  up  out  of  great  tribulation  to 
highest  honor.  Old  Sheba  had  not  cuffed  her 
grandson  to  church  every  week  in  vain.  He 
had  heard  a  great  deal  about  white  robes  and 
palms  of  victory  and  "  him  that  overcometh." 
By  some  twist  of  his  simple  little  brain  the 
term  Reverend  had  come  to  mean  all  that  to 
him,  and  much  more.  It  meant  not  only  some 
one  set  apart  in  a  priestly  way,  but  some  one 
who  was  just  slipping  down  into  the  mysterious 
valley  of  the  shadow,  with  the  shining  of  the 
New  Jerusalem  upon  his  face. 

As  long  as  the  cottage  was  in  sight  John  Jay 
kept  rolling  his  eyes  backward  as  he  trudged 
along  in  the  dust ;  but  Mars'  Nat  was  the  only 
one  in  view.     Twice  he  stumbled  and  almost 
spilled  the  eggs.     A  little  farther  along  he  con 
eluded  that  he  was  tired  enough  to  rest  a  while 
So  he  sat  down  on  a  log  in  a  shady  fence  cor 
ner,  and  took  a  green  apple  from  his  pocket. 
He  rolled  it  around  in  his  hands  and  over  his 
face,  enjoying  its  tempting  odor  before  he  stuck 
his  little  white  teeth  into  it.     The  first  bite  was 


OLE    MAMMY  S    TORMENT.  33 

so  sour  that  it  drew  his  face  all  up  into  a 
pucker  and  made  his  eyes  water.  He  raised 
his  hand  to  throw  it  away,  but  paused  with  his 
arm  in  the  air  to  listen.  Somebody  was  playing 
on  the  organ  in  the  church  a  few  rods  up  the 
hill. 

It  was  a  quaint  little  stone  church,  all  over- 
grown with  ivy,  that  the  Chadwicks  had  built 
generations  ago.  The  high  arched  door  was 
never  opened  of  late  years,  except  at  long  inter- 
vals, when  some  one  came  out  from  the  city  to 
hold  services.  But  the  side  door  was  certainly 
ajar  now,  for  the  saddest  music  that  John  Jay 
had  ever  heard  in  all  his  life  came  trembling 
out  on  the  warm  summer  air. 

Forgetting  all  about  his  errand,  he  scrambled 
through  the  fence  and  up  the  gently  rising 
knoll.  His  bare  feet  made  no  noise  as  he 
tiptoed  up  the  steps  and  stood  peering  through 
the  open  door.  It  was  dim  and  cool  inside, 
with  only  the  light  that  could  sift  through 
the  violet  and  amber  of  the  stained  glass  win- 
dows ;  but  in  one,  the  big  one  at  the  end,  was 
the  figure  of  a  snowy  dove,  with  outstretched 
wings.  Through  this  silvery  pane  a  long  slant- 
ing ray  of  light,  dazzling  in  its  white  radiance, 


34  OLE  MAMMY'S  TORMENT. 

streamed  across  the  keys  of  the  organ  and  the 
man  who  played  them,  —  the  Reverend  George. 

It  threw  a  strange  light  on  the  upturned 
face,  —  a  face  black  as  ebony,  worn  with  suffer- 
ing, but  showing  in  every  feature  the  refining 
touch  of  a  noble  spirit.  His  mournful  eyes 
seemed  looking  into  another  world,  while  hie 
fingers  wandered  over  the  keys  with  the  musi- 
cal instinct  of  his  race. 

John  Jay  slipped  inside  and  crouched  down 
behind  a  tall  pew.  The  only  music  that  he 
had  been  accustomed  to  was  the  kind  that 
Uncle  Billy  scraped  from  his  fiddle  and  plunked 
on  his  banjo.  It  was  the  gay,  rollicking  kind, 
that  put  his  feet  to  jigging  and  every  muscle 
in  his  body  quivering  in  time.  This  made  him 
want  to  cry ;  yet  it  was  so  sweet  and  deep 
and  tender  as  it  went  rolling  softly  down  the 
aisles,  that  he  forgot  all  about  the  eggs  and 
Miss  Hallie.  He  forgot  that  he  was  John  Jay. 
All  he  thought  of  was  that  upturned  face  with 
the  strange  unearthly  light  in  its  dark  eyes,  and 
the  melody  that  swept  over  him. 

A  spell  of  coughing  seized  the  rapt  musician. 
After  it  had  passed,  he  lay  forward  on  the  organ 
a  while,  with  his  head  bowed  on  his  arms.  Then 


OLE  MAMMY'S  TORMENT.  35 

he  straightened  himself  up  wearily,  and  began 
pushing  the  stops  back  into  their  places. 

The  silence  brought  John  Jay  to  his  senses. 
He  crawled  along  the  aisle  and  out  of  the  door, 
blinkling  like  an  owl  as  he  came  into  the  blind- 
ing sunshine.  Many  experiences  had  convinced 
him  that  he  was  born  under  an  unlucky  star. 
When  he  went  leaping  down  the  hill  to  the  log 
where  he  had  left  his  basket,  it  was  with  the 
sickening  certainty  that  some  evil  had  befallen 
the  eggs.  He  was  afraid  to  look  for  fear  of 
finding  a  mass  of  broken  shells  strewn  over  the 
ground.  It  was  with  a  feeling  of  surprise  that 
he  saw  the  white  ends  of  the  top  layer  of  eggs 
peeping  out  of  their  bed  of  bran,  just  as  he  had 
left  them.  With  a  sigh  of  relief  he  picked  up 
the  basket ;  then  whistling  gaily  as  a  mocking- 
bird, he  set  out  once  more  in  the  direction  of 
Rosehaven. 


CHAPTER  IV. 

SOMETHING  unusual  was  going  on  at  Rose- 
haven.  Awnings  were  spread  over  the  lawn, 
gay  colored  lanterns  were  strung  all  about  the 
grounds,  and  a  stage  for  outdoor  tableaux  had 
been  built  near  the  house,  where  a  dark  clump 
of  cedars  served  as  a  background. 

John  Jay  had  orders  to  take  the  eggs  directly 
to  the  cook,  but  his  curiosity  kept  him  standing 
open-mouthed  on  the  lawn,  watching  the  hang- 
ing of  the  lanterns. 

A  group  of  pretty  girls  sat  on  the  porch 
steps,  between  the  white  rose-twined  pillars. 
One  of  them  was  tying  up  the  cue  of  an  old- 
fashioned  wig  with  a  black  ribbon  ;  another 
was  mending  the  gold  lace  on  a  velvet  coat, 
and  the  others  were  busy  with  the  various 
costumes  which  they  were  to  wear  in  the  tab- 
leaux. Now  and  then  a  gay  trill  or  a  snatch 
from  some  popular  song  floated. out  above  their 
laughing  chatter.  Suddenly  one  of  them  looked 
36 


39 

up  and  saw  John  Jay  standing  in  the  gravelled 
drive. 

"  Look,  girls  !  "  she  exclaimed.  "  Here's  the 
very  thing  we  want  for  our  old  Virginia  days ! 
Hallie  looks  like  a  picture  in  that  lovely  bro- 
caded satin  of  her  grandmother's,  and  Raleigh 
Stanford  does  the  cavalier  to  perfection  in  that 
farewell  scene.  All  it  lacks  is  some  little  Jim 
Crow  to  hold  his  horse,  and  there  is  one  now. 
Oh,  Hallie  !  come  out  here  a  minute  !  " 

In  response  to  her  call,  a  beautiful  dark- 
haired  girl  came  out  on  the  porch  from  the 
hall,  carrying  a  pasteboard  shield  which  she 
had  just  finished  covering  with  tinfoil.  John 
Jay's  mouth  opened  still  wider  as  it  flashed  a 
dazzling  light  into  his  eyes.  He  thought  it  was 
silver. 

"  Isn't  it  fine  ? "  she  asked,  waltzing  around 
with  it  on  her  arm  for  them  to  admire  the 
effect.  Then  she  dropped  down  on  the  step 
above  them.  "Was  it  you  who  called  me, 
Sally  Lou  ?  "  she  asked. 

"Yes,"  answered  the  girl,  who  had  finished 
tying  up  the  cue,  and  now  had  the  wig  pulled 
coquettishly  over  her  blonde  curls.  "  Look  at 
the  little  darkey  over  there.  I  was  just  telling 


40  OLE  MAMMY'S  TORMENT. 

the  girls  that  he  is  all  that  is  needed  to  com- 
plete your  cavalier  tableau.  Call  him  over 
here  and  tell  him  that  he  must  come  to-night." 
Just  then  the  boy  turned  and  started  on  a  trot 
to  the  kitchen.  "  Why,  it's  John  Jay ! "  ex- 
claimed Hallie.  "  Old  Lucy  has  been  scolding 
about  those  eggs  for  the  last  two  hours.  His 
grandmother  promised  to  send  them  over  im- 
mediately after  breakfast.  I'll  go  down  and 
see  what  kept  him  so  long.  He  is  always  get- 
ting into  trouble." 

"  Make  him  come  up  here,"  begged  Sally 
Lou,  "and  get  him  to  talk  for  us.  I  know 
he'll  be  lots  of  fun,  for  he  has  such  a  bright 
face." 

In  a  few  moments  the  laughing  young  hostess 
was  back  among  her  guests,  with  John  Jay  fol- 
lowing her.  "  Don't  you  want  to  see  all  my 
birthday  presents  ?  "  she  asked,  leading  the  way 
into  the  library  and  beckoning  the  girls  to  fol- 
low. "  See  !  I  found  this  mandolin  in  my  chair 
when  I  went  to  the  breakfast-table  this  morn- 
ing, and  this  watch  was  under  my  napkin. 
This  tennis-racquet  was  on  the  piano  when  I 
came  up-stairs,  and  I've  been  finding  books  and 
things  all  morning."  She  opened  a  great  box 


OLE  MAMMY'S  TORMENT.  41 

of  chocolate  bonbons  as  she  spoke,  and  filled 
both  his  hands. 

He  looked  about  him  with  round,  astonished 


eyes,  but  never  said  a  word  in  answer  to  the 
eager  questions  of  the  girls,  beyond  a  bashful 
"yessa"  or  "no'm." 


42  OLE  MAMMY'S  TORMENT. 

The  arrival  of  Raleigh  Stanford  and  one  of 
his  friends,  on  their  wheels,  put  an  end  to  the 
girls'  interest  in  John  Jay.  He  was  dismissed 
with  a  message  to  Sheba  that  sent  him  flying 
home  through  the  woods  like  an  excited  little 
whirlwind.  The  lid  of  the  basket  flopped  up 
and  down,  in  time  to  the  motion  of  his  scamper- 
ing feet.  At  the  foot  of  the  hill  he  began  call- 
ing "  Mammy  !  "  and  kept  it  up  until  he  reached 
the  door.  By  that  time,  he  was  so  out  of  breath 
that  he  could  only  gasp  his  message.  Sheba 
was  expected  to  be  at  Rosehaven  at  seven 
o'clock,  and  John  Jay  was  to  take  part  in  the 
performance  on  the  lawn. 

It  took  a  great  deal  of  cross-questioning  be- 
fore Mammy  fully  understood  the  arrangement. 
She  could  readily  see  that  her  services  might 
be  desired  in  the  kitchen,  but  it  puzzled  her  to 
know  what  anybody  could  want  of  John  Jay. 
She  shook  her  head  a  great  many  times  before 
she  finally  promised  that  he  might  go. 

Bud  had  passed  a  very  dull  morning  without 
his  adventurous  brother.  Now  he  came  up 
with  a  bit  of  rope  with  which  to  play  horse. 
But  John  Jay  was  looking  down  on  such  sports 
at  present. 


OLE    MAMMY  S    TORMENT.  43 

"  Aw,  go  way,  boy,"  he  said,  with  a  lofty  air. 
"  I  ain't  no  hawse.  Fse  goin'  to  a  buthday- 
pa'ty  to-night.  Miss  Hallie  done  give  me  an 
invite  —  me  .an'  Mammy." 

"  Whose  goin'  to  stay  with  me  an'  Ivy  ? " 
asked  Bud,  anxiously. 

"  Aunt  Susan,  I  reckon,"  answered  John  Jay. 
"  Mammy  tole  me  to  go  ask  her.  Come  along 
with  me,  an'  I'll  tell  you  what  all  Miss  Hallie 
got  for  her  buthday.  I  reckon  she  had  mos'  a 
thousand  presents,  an'  a  box  of  candy  half  as 
big  as  Ivy." 

Bud  opened  his  eyes  in  amazement. 

"  Deed  she  did,"  persisted  John  Jay,  enjoying 
the  sensation  he  was  making.  "  She  gave  me 
some,  and  I  saved  a  piece  for  you."  After  much 
searching  through  his  pockets,  John  Jay  handed 
out  a  big  chocolate  cream  that  had  been  mashed 
flat.  Bud  ate  it  gratefully  as  they  walked  on, 
and  wiped  his  lips  with  his  little  red  tongue, 
longing  for  more. 

After  supper,  as  Mammy  and  John  Jay  went 
down  the  narrow  meadow  path  in  Indian  file, 
he  ventured  a  question  that  he  had  pondered 
all  day.  "  Mammy,  does  we  all  have  buthdays 
same  as  white  folks? " 


44  OLE    MAMMY  S    TORMENT. 

"  Of  co'se,"  answered  the  old  woman,  tramp- 
ing on  ahead  with  her  skirts  held  high  out  of 
the  dewy  grass. 

"  When's  yoah's  ?  "  he  asked,  after  a  pause. 

"  Well,"  she  began  reflectively,  not  willing 
to  acknowledge  that  she  had  never  known  the 
exact  date,  "  I'm  nevah  ve'y  p'tick'lah  'bout  its 
obsa'vation.  It's  on  a  Monday,  long  in  early 
garden-makin'  time." 

They  had  come  to  a  little  brook,  bridged  by  a 
wide,  hewed  log.  When  they  had  crossed  in 
careful  silence,  John  Jay  began  again.  "  Mammy, 
when's  my  buthday  ?" 

"I  kaint  tell  'zactly,  honey,"  she  answered, 
"  'twel  I  adds  it  up."  As  she  began  counting  on 
her  fingers,  her  skirts  slipped  lower  and  lower 
from  her  grasp,  until  they  brushed  the  dew  of 
the  wayside  weeds. 

"  Yes,  that's  it,"  she  announced  at  last. 
"  Miss  Hallie  is  nineteen  this  Satiddy,  and  you'll 
be  nine  next  Satiddy.  A  week  from  to-day  is 
yoah  buthday.  Pity  it  hadn't  a-happened  to  be 
the  same  day,  then  maybe  Mis'  Haven  mought 
a  give  you  somethin'  like  Mis'  Alice  give  Jint- 
sey's  boy." 

John  Jay  had  that  same  thought  all  the  rest 


OLE  MAMMY'S  TORMENT.  45 

of  the  way  to  Rosehaven,  but  after  they  entered 
the  brilliantly  illuminated  grounds  he  seemed  to 
stop  thinking  altogether.  It  was  a  sight  beyond 
all  that  his  wildest  imaginings  had  pictured. 
He  did  not  recognize  the  place.  All  the  lan- 
terns were  lighted  now,  hanging  like  strings  of 
stars  around  the  porches,  and  from  tree  to  tree. 
Violins  played  softly,  somewhere  out  of  sight, 
and  everywhere  on  the  night  air  was  the  breath 
of  myriads  of  roses.  Handsomely  dressed 
people  passed  in  and  out  of  the  house,  and  across 
the  lawn.  The  light,  the  music,  and  the  perfume 
made  the  place  seem  enchanted  ground  to  the 
bewildered  little  John  Jay,  and  when  he  reached 
the  illuminated  fountain  just  in  front  of  the 
house,  he  clung  to  Mammy's  skirts  as  if  he  had 
suddenly  found  himself  in  some  strange  Eden, 
and  was  frightened  by  its  unearthly  beauty, 

The  fountain  into  which,  only  that  morning, 
he  had  thrust  his  hot  little  face  for  a  drink,  now 
seemed  bewitched.  It  was  no  longer  a  flow  of 
sparkling  water,  but  of  splashing  rainbows. 
From  palest  green  to  ruby  red,  from  amethyst 
to  amber  it  paled  and  deepened  and  glowed. 

All  the  evening  he  moved  about  like  one  in  a 
dream.  The  tableaux  with  their  shifting  scenes 


46  OLE  MAMMY'S  TORMENT. 

of  knights  and  ladies  and  marble  statuary  were 
burned  on  his  memory  as  heavenly  visions.  He 
knew  nothing  of  the  tinsel  and  flour  and  red 
lights  which  produced  the  effect.  He  stood 
about  as  Miss  Hallie  told  him  :  he  held  a  horse 
in  one  tableau,  and  posed  as  a  bronze  statue  in 
another.  Then  he  went  back  to  the  fountain, 
and  sat  dreamily  watching  it,  while  the  violins 
played  again, —  in  the  long  parlors  this  time, 
where  the  dancing  had  begun. 

Raleigh  Stanford,  still  in  his  cavalier  cos- 
tume, and  with  Miss  Sally  Lou  on  his  arm, 
spied  him  as  they  passed  by.  "  Oh,  there's  that 
funny  little  fellow  that  was  here  this  morning  !  " 
she  said.  "  We  tried  to  make  him  talk,  but  he 
just  kept  his  head  on  one  side,  and  was  too  em- 
barrassed to  say  anything." 

"  Hey,  Sambo,"  called  the  young  man  sud- 
denly in  his  ear.  "  What  do  you  know  ?  " 

John  Jay  gave  a  start,  and  looked  up  at  the 
amused  faces  above  him.  He  took  the^  question 
seriously,  and  thought  he  must  really  tell  what 
he  knew  ;  but  just  at  that  moment  he  could 
remember  only  one  thing  in  all  the  wide  world. 
Every  other  bit  of  information  seemed  to  desert 
him.  So  he  stammered,  "  I — I  know  M — Miss 


OLE  MAMMY'S  TORMENT.  47 

Hallie,  she's  nineteen  this  Satiddy,  an'  I'll  be 
nine  next  Satiddy." 

Miss  Sally  Lou  laughed  so  gaily  that  her 
young  cavalier  made  another  effort  to  please 
her. 

"  Is  that  so  !  "  he  exclaimed,  as  if  surprised. 
"  It's  a  mighty  lucky  thing  you  told  me  that, 
now,  or  I  never  would  have  thought  to  bring 
you  anything.  You  didn't  know  that  I  am  a 
sort  of  birthday  Santa  Claus,  did  you  ?  Just 
look  out  for  me  next  Saturday.  If  I'm  not 
there  by  breakfast-time,  wait  till  noon,  and  if  I 
don't  get  there  by  that  time  it'll  be  because 
something  has  happened  ;  anyway,  somebody'll 
be  prancing  along  about  sundown." 

"  Oh,  come  along,  Raleigh,"  said  Miss  Sally 
Lou,  moving  off  toward  the  house.  "  You're 
such  a  tease." 

John  Jay,  sitting  beside  that  wonderful  foun- 
tain and  surrounded  by  so  many  strange,  beau- 
tiful things,  did  not  think  it  at  all  queer  that 
such  an  unheard-of  person  as  a  birthday  Santa 
Claus  should  suddenly  step  out  from  the  midst 
of  the  enchantment  and  speak  to  him. 

"A  blue  velvet  cape  on,"  he  said  to  himself, 
thinking  how  he  should  describe  him  to  Bud. 


48  OLE  MAMMY'S  TORMENT. 

"  An'  gole  buckles  on  his  shoes,  an'  a  sword  on, 
an'  a  long  white  feathah  in  his  hat.  Cricky ! 
An'  it  was  his  hawse  I  done  held !  Maybe  it 
will  be  somethin'  mighty  fine  what  he's  goin'  to 
bring  me,  'cause  I  did  that ! " 

Later  he  found  his  way  to  the  kitchen,  where 
Sheba  was  washing  dishes.  The  cook  gave  him 
a  plate  of  ice-cream  and  some  scraps  of  cake. 
She  was  telling  Sheba  how  beautiful  Miss 
Hallie's  birthday  cake  looked  at  dinner,  with 
its  nineteen  little  wax  candles  all  aflame.  That 
was  the  last  thing  John  Jay  remembered,  until 
some  one  shook  him,  and  told  him  it  was  time  to 
go  home.  He  had  fallen  asleep  with  a  spoon 
in  his  hand. 

Mammy  was  afraid  to  take  the  short  cut 
through  the  woods  after  dark,  so  she  led  him 
away  round  by  the  toll-gate.  He  was  so  sleepy 
that  he  staggered  up  against  her  every  few 
steps,  and  he  would  have  dropped  down  on 
the  first  log  he  came  to,  if  she  had  not  kept 
tight  hold  of  his  hand  all  the  way. 

When  they  reached  Uncle  Billy's  house,  he 
had  just  gone  out  to  draw  a  pitcher  of  water. 
Mammy  stopped  to  get  a  drink,  and  John  Jay 
leaned  up  against  the  well-shed.  The  rumbling 


OLE    MAMMY  S    TORMENT.  49 

of  the  windlass  and  the  fall  of  the  bucket  against 
the  water  below  aroused  him  somewhat,  and  by 
the  time  he  had  swallowed  half  a  gourdful  of 
the  cold  well-water  he  was  wide  awake. 

Uncle  Billy  went  up  to  the  cabin  with  them 
in  order  to  hear  an  account  of  the  party,  and  to 
walk  back  with  Aunt  Susan.  John  Jay  fell  be- 
hind. He  could  not  remember  ever  having  been 
out  so  late  at  night  before,  and  he  had  never  seen 
the  sky  so  full  of  stars.  They  made  him  think  of 
something  that  Aunt  Susan  had  told  him.  She 
said  that  if  he  counted  seven  stars  for  seven 
nights,  at  the  same  time  repeating  a  charm  which 
she  taught  him,  and  making  a  wish,  he'd  certainly 
get  what  he  wanted  at  the  end  of  the  week. 

Now  he  stopped  still  in  the  path,  and  slowly 
pointing  to  each  star  with  his  little  black  fore- 
finger, as  he  counted  them,  solemnly  repeated 
the  charm : 

"  Star-light,  star  bright, 
Seventh  star  I've  seen  to-night; 
I  wish  I  may  and  I  wish  I  might 
Have  the  wish  come  true  I  wish  to-night." 

"  Come  on  in,  chile !  What  you  gawkin'  at  ?  " 
called  Mammy  from  the  doorway.  John  Jay 


50  OLE  MAMMY'S  TORMENT. 

made  no  answer.  It  would  have  broken  the 
charm  to  have  spoken  again  before  going  to 
sleep.  He  hurried  into  the  house,  glad  that 
Mammy  was  so  occupied  with  her  company 
that  she  could  pay  no  attention  to  him.  She 
stood  in  the  door  with  them  so  long  that  John 
Jay  was  in  bed  by  the  time  she  came  in.  Al- 
though he  pretended  to  be  asleep,  inwardly  he 
was  in  a  quiver  of  excitement. 

"  I'll  count  'em  every  night,"  he  thought. 
The  wish  that  burned  in  his  little  heart  was 
a  very  earnest  one,  fraught  with  hopes  for  his 
coming  birthday. 


CHAPTER  V. 

LATE  hours  did  not  agree  with  John  Jay. 
Next  morning  he  felt  too  tired  to  stir.  He 
groaned  when  he  remembered  that  it  was  Sun- 
day, for  he  thought  of  the  long,  hot  walk  down 
to  Briar  Crook  church.  To  his  great  surprise, 
Mammy  did  not  insist  on  his  going  with  her : 
she  had  been  offered  a  seat  in  a  neighbor's 
spring-wagon,  and  there  was  no  room  for  him. 

So  he  spent  a  long,  lazy  morning,  stretched 
out  in  the  shade  of  the  apple-tree.  A  smell 
of  clover  and  ripening  orchards  filled  the  heated 
air.  The  hens  clucked  around  drowsily  with 
drooping  wings.  A  warm  breeze  stirred  the 
grasses  where  he  lay. 

Ivy  dug  in  the  dirt  with  a  broken  spoon, 
while  Bud  kicked  up  his  heels  beside  John  Jay, 
listening  to  a  marvellous  account  of  Miss  Hallie's 
party.  It  lost  nothing  in  the  telling.  For  years 
after,  John  Jay  looked  back  upon  that  night  as  a 
John  of  Patmos  might  have  looked,  remembering 
51 


52  OLE  MAMMY'S  TORMENT. 

some  vision  of  the  opened  heavens.  The 
lights,  the  music,  the  white-robed  figures,  and 
above  all,  that  wonderful  fountain  looking  as  if 
it  must  have  sprung  from  some  "  sea  of  glass 
mingled  with  fire,"  did  not  belong  to  the  earth 
with  which  he  was  acquainted.  He  repeated 
some  part  of  that  recollection  to  Bud  every 


day  for  a  week,  always  ending  with  the  sen- 
tence uppermost  in  his  thought:  "And  next 
Satiddy  /  has  a  buthday." 

Of  course  he  knew  that  his  celebration  could 
be  nothing  like  Miss  Hallie's  ;  but  he  had  a 
vague  idea  that  something  would  happen  to 
make  the  day  unusual  and  delightful.  Every 


OLE    MAMMY  S    TORMENT.  53 

night  after  he  had  gone  to  bed,  and  when 
Mammy  was  drowsing  on  the  doorstep,  he 
raised  himself  to  his  knees,  and  looked  through 
a  wide  hole  in  the  wall  where  the  chinking  had 
dropped  out  from  between  the  logs.  Through 
this  he  could  see  a  strip  of  sky  studded  with 
twinkling  stars.  One  by  one  he  pointed  out 
the  magic  seven,  repeating  the  charm  and  whis- 
pering the  wish. 

It  was  a  long  week,  because  he  was  in  such 
a  hurry  for  it  to  go  by.  But  Friday  night  came 
at  last ;  and,  as  he  counted  the  stars  for  the 
seventh  time,  the  little  flutter  of  excitement  in 
his  veins  made  them  seem  to  dance  before  his 
eyes. 

Early  Saturday  morning  he  was  awakened 
by  Mammy's  stirring  around  outside  among  the 
chickens,  and  instantly  he  remembered  that 
the  long-looked-for  day  had  come.  Somehow, 
a  feeling  of  expectancy  made  it  seem  different 
from  other  days.  He  wanted  it  to  last  just  as 
long  as  possible,  so  he  lay  there  thinking  about 
it,  and  wondering  what  would  happen  first. 

As  soon  as  he  was  dressed,  Mammy  sent  him 
to  the  spring  for  water.  He  was  gone  some 
time,  for  he  had  a  faint  hope  that  the  birthday 


54  OLE  MAMMY'S  TORMENT. 

Santa  Claus  whom  he  had  met  at  Miss  Hallie's 
party  might  come  early,  and  he  spent  several 
minutes  looking  down  the  road. 

Breakfast  was  ready  when  he  reached  the 
house,  and  he  set  the  pail  down  in  such  a  hurry 
that  some  of  the  water  slopped  out  on  his 
bare  toes.  His  wistful  eyes  scanned  the  table 
quickly.  There  was  a  better  breakfast  than 
usual  —  bacon  and  eggs  this  morning.  There 
was  no  napkin  on  the  table  under  which  some 
gift  might  lie  in  hiding,  but  remembering  Miss 
Hallie's  other  experiences,  he  pulled  out  his 
chair.  A  little  shade  of  disappointment  crept 
into  his  face  when  he  found  it  empty. 

After  he  had  speared  a  piece  of  bacon  with 
his  two-tined  fork,  and  landed  it  safely  on  his 
plate,  he  rolled  his  eyes  around  the  table. 
"  Did  you  know  this  is  my  buthday,  Mammy  ?  " 
he  asked.  "  I'm  nine  yeahs  ole  to-day." 

"That's  so,  honey,"  she  answered,  cheerfully. 
"You'se  gettin'  to  be  a  big  boy  now,  plenty 
big  enough  to  keep  out  o'  mischief  an'  take 
keer  o'  yo'  clothes.  I'll  declare  if  there  isn't 
anothah  hole  in  yo'  shirt  this  blessed  minute !  " 

The  lecture  that  followed  was  not  of  the 
gala-day  kind,  but  John  Jay  consoled  himself 


OLE  MAMMY'S  TORMENT.  55 

by  thinking  that  he  would  probably  have  had  a 
cuffing  instead  had  it  happened  on  any  other  day. 

After  breakfast  Mammy  went  away  to  do  a 
day's  scrubbing  at  Rosehaven.  The  children 
spent  most  of  the  morning  in  watching  the  road. 
Every  cloud  of  dust  that  tokened  an  approach- 
ing traveller  raised  a  new  hope.  Many  people 
went  by  on  horses  or  in  carriages.  Once  in  a 
while  there  was  a  stray  bicycler,  but  nobody 
turned  in  towards  the  cabin. 

After  a  while,  in  virtue  of  its  being  his  espe- 
cial holiday,  John  Jay  ordered  the  smaller  chil- 
dren to  stay  in  the  yard,  while  he  took  a  swim 
in  the  pond.  But  the  pleasure  did  not  last 
long.  He  could  only  splash  and  paddle  around 
dog-fashion,  and  the  sun  burnt  his  back  so  badly 
that  he  was  glad  to  get  out  of  the  water. 

Afternoon  came,  and  nothing  unusual  had 
happened,  but  John  Jay  kept  up  his  courage 
and  looked  around  for  something  to  do  to 
occupy  the  time.  A  wide  plank  leaned  up 
against  the  little  shed  at  one  side  of  the  cabin. 
It  made  him  think  of  Uncle  Billy's  cellar  door, 
where  he  had  spent  many  a  happy  hour  sliding. 

"  I'm  goin'  to  have  a  coast,"  he  said  to  Bud. 
A  smooth  board  which  he  found  near  the 


56  OLE  MAMMY'S  TORMENT. 

woodpile  furnished  him  with  a  fine  toboggan.  By 
the  help  of  an  overturned  chicken-coop,  which 
he  dragged  across  the  yard,  he  managed  to 
climb  fo  the  top  of  the  shed.  Squatting  down 
on  the  board,  he  gave  himself  a  starting  push 
with  one  hand.  The  downward  progress  was 
not  so  smooth  or  so  rapid  as  he  desired. 

"  Needs  greasin',"  he  said,  looking  at  the 
plank  with  a  knowing  frown.  A  rummage 
through  the  old  corner  cupboard  where  the 
provisions  were  kept  provided  him  with  a  wide 
strip  of  bacon  rind,  such  as  Uncle  Billy  used 
to  rub  on  his  saw.  John  Jay  carried  it  out  of 
doors  and  carefully  rubbed  the  plank  from  one 
end  to  the  other.  Then  he  greased  the  under- 
side of  the  little  board  on  which  he  intended  to 
sit.  The  result  was  all  he  could  wish.  He 
slid  down  the  plank  at  a  speed  that  took 
his  breath.  Up  he  climbed  from  the  coop  to 
the  shed,  carrying  his  board  with  him,  and 
clown  he  slid  to  the  ground,  time  and  again, 
yelling  and  laughing  as  he  went,  until  Bud 
began  to  be  anxious  for  his  turn.  When  the 
little  fellow  was  boosted  to  the  shed,  he  did  not 
make  a  noise  as  John  Jay  had  done ;  he  slid  in 
solemn  silence  and  unspoken  delight. 


OLE  MAMMY'S  TORMENT.  57 

Over  an  hour  of  such  sport  had  gone  by 
when  Bud  remarked,  "Ivy's  a-missin'  all  the 
fun." 

"She's  too  little  to  go  down  by  herself," 
answered  John  Jay ;  "  but  if  I  had  another 
little  board  I'd  take  her  down  in  front  of  me." 

He  began  looking  around  the  wood-pile  for 
one.  Then  he  caught  sight  of  the  big  dish-pan, 
which  had  been  set  outside  on  the  logs  to  sun. 

"  That's  the  ve'y  thing !  "  he  exclaimed. 
"It'll  jus'  hole  her."  The  bacon  rind  was 
nearly  rubbed  dry  by  this  time,  but  the  pan, 
heated  by  sitting  so  long  in  the  sun,  drew  out 
all  the  grease  that  remained.  It  took  the 
united  strength  of  both  boys  to  get  Ivy  to  the 
top  of  the  shed,  but  at  last  she  was  seated,  with 
John  Jay  just  behind  her  on  his  little  board, 
his  legs  thrown  protectingly  around  the  pan. 
They  shot  down  so  fast  that  Ivy  was  terrified. 
No  sooner  was  she  dumped  out  of  the  pan  on 
to  the  ground  than  she  retired  to  a  safe  dis- 
tance, and  stuck  her  thumb  in  her  mouth. 
Nothing  could  induce  her  to  get  in  again. 

"  I'm  goin'  down  in  the  dish-pan  by  myself," 
announced  Bud  from  the  shed  roof.  "It  jus' 
fits  me." 


58  OLE  MAMMY'S  TORMENT. 

John  Jay  grinned,  and  stood  a  little  to  one 
side  to  watch  the  performance.  "  Go  it,  Brer 
Tarrypin  !  "  he  shouted. 

Maybe  Bud  leaned  a  little  too  much  to  one 
side.  Maybe  the  pan  missed  the  guiding  legs 
that  had  held  it  steady  before.  At  any  rate  some- 
thing was  amiss,  for  half-way  down  the  plank 
it  spun  dizzily  around  to  one  side,  and  spilled 
the  luckless  Bud  out  on  the  chicken-coop. 
Usually  he  made  very  little  fuss  when  he  was 
hurt,  but  this  time  he  set  up  such  a  roar  that 
John  Jay  was  frightened.  When  he  saw  blood 
trickling  out  of  the  child's  mouth,  he  began  to 
cry  himself.  He  was  just  about  to  run  for 
Aunt  Susan,  when  Bud  suddenly  stopped  cry- 
ing, and  turned  toward  him  with  a  look  of 
terror. 

"  Aw,  I  done  knock  a  tooth  out !  "  he  ex- 
claimed, and  began  crying  harder  than  before, 
feeling  that  he  had  been  damaged  beyond 
repair. 

John  Jay  laughed  when  he  found  that  noth- 
ing worse  had  happened  than  the  loss  of  a 
little  white  front  tooth,  and  soon  dried  Bud's 
tears  by  promising  that  a  new  one  would  cer- 
tainly fill  the  hole  in  time. 


OLE    MAMMY  S    TORMENT.  59 

"Keep  yoah  mouf  shet  much  as  you  can 
when  Mammy  comes  home  to-night,"  he  cau- 
tioned;  "for  I  sut'n'ly  don't  want  to  ketch  a 
lickin'  on  my  buthday.  It's  mighty  lucky  the 
pan  didn't  get  a  hole  knocked  in  her." 

Mammy  came  home  just  before  dark.  The 
children  were  on  the  fence  waiting  for  her. 
John  Jay  felt  sure  that  if  Miss  Hallie  knew 
that  it  was  his  birthday  she  would  send  him 
something.  He  wondered  if  Mammy  had  told 
her.  The  basket  on  the  old  woman's  head  was 
always  interesting  to  these  children,  for  it  never 
came  back  from  Rosehaven  empty.  The  cook 
always  saved  the  scraps  for  Sheba's  hungry 
little  charges.  This  evening  John  Jay  kept  his 
eyes  fixed  on  it  expectantly,  as  he  followed  it 
up  the  walk.  He  had  thrown  one  foot  up 
behind  him,  and  rested  the  toes  of  it  in  his 
clasped  hands  as  he  hopped  along  on  the  other. 
Maybe  there  might  be  a  birthday  cake  in  that 
basket,  with  little  candles  on  it.  He  didn't 
know,  of  course,  —  but  —  maybe. 

They  all  crowded  around,  as  Sheba  put  the 
basket  on  the  table  and  took  out  some  scraps 
of  boiled  ham,  a  handful  of  cookies,  and  half  of 
an  apple  pie.  That  was  all.  John  Jay  looked 


6o  OLE  MAMMY'S  TORMENT. 

at  them  a  moment  with  misty  eyes,  and  turned 
away  with  a  lump  in  his  throat.  He  was  be- 
ginning to  grow  discouraged. 

Mammy  was  so  tired  that  she  did  not  cook 
anything  for  supper,  as  she  had  intended,  but 
set  out  the  contents  of  the  basket  beside  the 
corn  bread  left  from  dinner.  Before  they  were 
through  eating  somebody  called  for  sis'  Sheba 
to  come  quick,  that  Aunt  Susan  was  having 
one  of  her  old  spells. 

"  Like  enough  I  won't  get  back  for  a  good 
while,"  said  Mammy,  as  she -hurriedly  left  the 
table.  "  Put  Ivy  to  bed  as  soon  as  you  wash 
her  face,  John  Jay,  an'  go  yo'self  when  the 
propah  time  comes.  Be  a  good  boy  now,  and 
don't  forget  to  close  the  doah  tight  when  you 
go  in." 

When  Ivy  was  safely  tucked  away  among 
the  pillows,  the  two  boys  sat  down  on  the 
door-step  to  wait  once  more  for  the  birthday 
Santa  Claus.  John  Jay  repeated  what  the 
thoughtless  fellow  had  said : 

"  If  I  don't  get  there  by  noon,  it'll  be 
because  something  has  happened ;  anyway, 
somebody'll  be  prancing  along  about  sun- 
down." In  the  week  just  passed,  Bud  had 


OLE  MAMMY'S  TORMENT.  61 

come  to  believe  in  the  birthday  Santa  Glaus 
as  firmly  as  John  Jay. 

"  Wondah  wot  he's  doin'  now  ? "  he  said, 
after  a  long  pause  and  an  anxious  glance 
down  the  darkening  road. 

Ah,  well  for  those  two  trusting  little  hearts 
that  they  could  not  know !  He  was  sitting 
on  the  steps  of  the  porch  at  Rosehaven  with 
a  guitar  on  his  knee,  and  smiling  tenderly  into 
Sally  Lou's  blue  eyes  as  he  sang,  "  Oh,  yes,  I 
ever  will  be  true  !  " 

It  grew  darker  and  darker.  The  katydids 
began  their  endless  quarrel  in  the  trees.  A 
night-owl  hooted  dismally  over  in  the  woods. 
The  children  stopped  talking,  and  sat  in  anxious 
silence.  Presently  Bud  edged  up  closer,  and 
put  a  sympathetic  arm  around  his  brother.  A 
moment  after,  he  began  to  cry. 

"What  you  snufflin'  for?"  asked  John  Jay 
savagely.  "  'Tain't  yo'  buthday." 

"  But  I'm  afraid  you  ain't  goin'  to  have 
any  eithah,"  sobbed  the  little  fellow,  strangely 
wrought  upon  by  this  long  silent  waiting  in 
the  darkness. 

"  Aw,  you  go  'long  to  bed,"  said  John  Jay, 
with  a  careless,  grown-up  air.  "  If  anything 


62  OLE  MAMMY'S  TORMENT. 

comes  I'll  wake  you  up.  No  use  for  two  of 
us  to  be  settin'  heah." 

Bud  was  sleepy,  and  crept  away  obediently ; 
but  the  day  was  spoiled,  and  he  went  to  bed 
sore  with  his  brother's  disappointment. 

John  Jay  sat  down  again  to  keep  his  lonely 
tryst.  He  looked  up  at  the  faithless  stars. 
They  had  failed  to  help  him,  but  in  his  des- 
peration he  determined  to  appeal  to  them  once 
more.  So  he  picked  out  the  seven  largest 
ones  he  could  see  and  repeated  very  slowly, 
in  a  voice  that  would  tremble,  the  old  charm : 

"  Star-light,  star  bright, 
Seventh  star  I've  seen  to-night; 
I  wish  I  may  and  I  wish  I  might 
Have  the  wish  come  true  I  wish  to-night." 

Then  he  made  his  wish  again,  with  a  heart- 
felt earnestness  that  was  almost  an  ache.  Oh, 
surely  the  day  was  not  going  to  end  in  this 
cruel  silence !  Just  then  he  heard  the  thud 
of  a  horse's  hoofs  on  the  wooden  bridge,  far 
down  the  road.  Nearer  and  louder  it  came. 
Somebody  was  prancing  by  at  last.  He  stood 
up,  straining  his  eyes  in  his  smiling  eagerness 
to  see.  Nearer  and  nearer  the  hoof-beats 


OLE  MAMMY'S  TORMENT.  63 

came  in  the  starlight.  "  Bookity  book  !  Bookity 
book!"  The  horseman  paused  a  moment  in 
front  of  Uncle  Billy's. 

John  Jay  hopped  from  one  foot  to  the  other 
in  his  impatient  gladness.  Then  his  heart 
sank  as  the  hoof-beats  went  on  down  the  road, 
Bookity  book!  Bookity  book!  growing  fainter 
and  fainter,  until  at  last  they  were  drowned 
by  the  voices  of  the  noisy  katydids. 

He  stood  still  a  moment,  so  bitterly  disap- 
pointed that  it  seemed  to  him  he  could  not 
possibly  bear  it.  Then  he  went  in  and  shut 
the  door,  —  shut  the  door  on  all  his  bright 
hopes,  on  all  his  fond  dreams,  on  the  day  that 
was  to  have  held  such  happiness,  but  that  had 
brought  instead  the  cruelest  disappointment 
of  his  life. 

The  tears  ran  down  his  little  black  face  as 
he  undressed  himself.  He  sat  on  the  edge 
of  the  trundle-bed  a  moment,  whispering  bro- 
kenly, "  They  wasn't  anybody  livin'  that  cared 
'bout  it's  bein'  my  buthday  !  "  Then  throwing 
himself  face  downward  on  his  pillow,  he  cried 
softly  with  long  choking  sobs,  until  he  fell 
asleep. 


CHAPTER   VI. 

ALTHOUGH  John  Jay  bore  many  a  deep  scar, 
both  in  mind  and  body,  very  little  of  his  life 
had  been  given  to  sackcloth  and  ashes. 

"Wish  I  could  take  trouble  as  easy  as  that 
boy,"  sighed  Mammy.  "  It  slides  right  off'n 
him  like  watah  off  a  duck's  back." 

"  He's  like  the  rollin'  stone  that  gethah's  no 
moss,"  remarked  Uncle  Billy.  "He  goes  rol- 
lickin'  through  the  days,  from  sunup  'twel  sun- 
down, so  fast  that  disappointment  and  sorrow 
get  rubbed  off  befo'  they  kin  strike  root." 

Despite  all  his  troubles,  if  John  Jay  had 
been  marking  his  good  times  with  white  stones, 
there  would  have  been  enough  to  build  a  wall  all 
around  the  little  cabin  by  the  end  of  the  summer. 
There  were  two  days  especially  that  he  remem- 
bered with  deepest  satisfaction :  one  was  the 
Saturday  when  Mars'  Nat  took  him  to  the  circus, 
and  the  other  was  the  Fourth  of  July,  when  all 
the  family  went  to  the  Oak  Grove  barbecue, 
64 


OLE  MAMMY'S  TORMENT.  67 

But  now  blackberry  season  had  begun,  —  a 
season  that  he  hated,  because  Mammy  expected 
him  to  help  her  early  and  late  in  the  patch. 
So  many  of  the  shining  berries  slipped  down 
his  throat,  so  many  things  called  his  attention 
away  from  the  brambly  bushes,  that  sometimes 
it  took  hours  for  him  to  fill  his  battered  quart 
cup. 

Usually  his  reward  was  a  juicy  pie,  but  this 
year  Mammy  changed  her  plan.  Berries  were 
in  demand  at  Rosehaven,  and  she  had  very 
little  time  to  spend  in  going  after  them. 

"  I'll  give  you  five  cents  a  gallon  for  all  you'll 
pick,"  she  said  to  John  Jay.  He  looked  at  her 
in  amazement.  As  he  had  never  had  any  money 
in  his  life,  this  seemed  a  princely  offer.  He 
was  standing  outside  by  the  stick  chimney  when 
she  made  the  promise.  After  one  sidelong 
glance,  to  see  if  she  were  in  earnest,  he  threw 
his  feet  wildly  into  the  air  and  walked  off  on 
his  hands  ;  then,  after  two  or  three  somersaults 
backward,  he  stood  up,  panting. 

"Where's  the  buckets  at?"  he  demanded. 
"  I'm  goin'  to  pick  every  bush  in  this  neck  o' 
woods  as  clean  as  you'd  pick  a  chicken." 

Now  it  was  Mammy's  turn  to  be  surprised. 


68 


She  had  expected  that  her  offer  would  lure  him 
on  for  an  hour  or  two,  maybe  for  a  whole  day. 
She  had  not  supposed  that  it  would  keep  him 
faithfully  at  work  for  a  week,  but  it  did.  His 
nimble  fingers  stripped  every  roadside  vine 
within  a  mile  of  the  cabin.  His  hands  and 
legs,  and  even  his  face,  were  criss-crossed  with 
many  brier  scratches.  The  sun  beat  down  on 
him  unmercifully,  but  he  stuck  to  his  task  so 
closely  that  he  seemed  to  see  berries  even  when 
his  eyes  were  shut.  Every  day  great  pailfuls 
of  the  shining  black  beads  were  sent  over  to 
Rosehaven,  and  every  night  he  dropped  a  few 
more  •  nickels  into  the  stocking  foot  hidden 
under  his  pillow. 

"  Berries  is  all  mighty  nigh  cleaned  out,"  he 
said  one  noon,  when  he  was  about  to  start  out 
again  after  dinner.  "  Uncle  Billy  says  there's 
lots  of  'em  down  in  the  gandah  thicket,  but  I'se 
mos'  afeered  to  go  there." 

"  Nothin'  won't  tech  you  in  daylight,  honey," 
answered  Mammy,  encouragingly,  "  but  I  would- 
n't go  through  there  at  night  for  love  or  money. 
I'd  as  lief  go  into  a  lion's  cage." 

"  Did  you  ever  see  any  ghos'es  down  there, 
Mammy  ? "  asked  John  Jay  with  eager  interest, 


OLE  MAMMY'S  TORMENT.  69 

yet  cautiously  lowering  his  voice  and  taking  a 
step  nearer. 

"No,"  admitted  Mammy,  "but  oldah  people 
than  I  have  seen  'em.  All  night  long  there's 
great  white  gandahs  flappin'  round  through 
that  thicket  'thout  any  heads  on.  You  know 
they's  an  awful  wicked  man  buried  down  there 
in  the  woods,  an'  the  sperrits  of  them  he's 
inju'ed  ha'nts  the  thicket  every  night.  There 
isn't  anybody,  that  I  know  of,  that  'ud  go  down 
there  aftah  dark  for  anything  on  this  livin' 
yearth." 

"  Then  who  sees  'em  ?  "  asked  John  Jay,  with 
a  skeptical  grin. 

"  Who  sees  'em  ? "  repeated  Mammy  wrath- 
fully,  angry  because  of  the  doubt  implied  by 
his  question  and  his  face.  "  Who  sees  'em  ? 
They've  been  seen  by  generations  of  them  as 
is  dead  and  gone.  Who  is  you,  I'd  like  to 
know,  standin'  up  there  a-mockin'  at  me  so 
impident  and  a-askin'  <  Who  sees  'em  ? ' ' 

She  turned  to  begin  her  dish  washing,  with  a 
scornful  air  that  seemed  to  say  that  he  was 
beneath  any  further  notice.  Still,  no  sooner 
had  she  piled  the  dishes  up  in  the  pan  than  she 
turned  to  him  again,  with  her  hands  on  her  hips. 


7O  OLE    MAMMY  S    TORMENT. 

"  Go  down  and  ask  Uncle  Mose,"  she  said, 
still  indignant.  "  He  can  tell  you  tales  that'll 
send  cole  chills  up  an'  down  yo'  spine.  He  saw 
an  awful  thing  in  there  once  with  his  own  eyes. 
'Twan't  a  gandah,  but  somethin'  long  an'  slim 
flyin'  low  in  the  bushes  —  he  reckoned  it  was 
twenty  feet  long.  It  had  a  little  thin  head  like 
a  snake,  an'  yeahs  that  stuck  up  like  rabbit's. 
It  was  all  white,  an'  had  fo'  little  short  legs  an' 
two  little  short  wings,  an'  it  was  moah'n  flesh 
an'  blood  could  stand,  he  say,  to  see  that  long, 
slim,  white  thing  runnin'  an'  a-flyin'  at  the  same 
time  through  the  bushes,  low  down  neah  the 
groun'.  You  jus'  go  ask  him." 

John  Jay  swung  his  buckets  irresolutely. 
"I  don't  believe  I'll  go  down  there  aftah  ber- 
ries," he  said.  "I  don't  know  what  to  do. 
They  isn't  any  moah  anywhere  else." 

Mammy  wished  that  she  had  not  gone  to 
such  pains  to  convince  him.  "  Nothin'  evah 
comes  around  in  the  daytime,"  she  insisted, 
"an'  I  reckon  berries  is  mighty  plentiful,  too," 
she  added,  persuasively.  "  Nobody  evah  saw 
anything  down  there  in  the  daylight,  honey. 
I'd  go  if  I  was  you." 

John  Jay  stood  on  one  foot.     He  was  afraid 


OLE  MAMMY'S  TORMENT.  71 

of  the  headless  ganders,  but  he  did  want  those 
berries.  He  walked  out  through  the  door,  hesi- 
tated, and  stood  on  one  foot  again.  Then  he 
went  slowly  down  the  hill.  Mammy,  standing 
in  the  door  with  her  apron  flung  over  her  head, 
watched  him  climb  up  on  the  fence  and  sit 
there  to  consider.  Finally,  he  dropped  down  to 
the  other  side,  and  started  in  the  direction  of 
the  gander  thicket. 

It  was  a  place  that  the  negroes  had  been 
afraid  of  since  her  earliest  recollection.  It  was 
only  a  little  stretch  of  woodland,  where  the 
neglected  underbrush  had  grown  into  a  tangled 
thicket.  No  one  remembered  now  what  had 
given  rise  to  the  name,  and  no  one  living  had 
ever  seen  the  ghostly  white  ganders  that  -were 
said  to  haunt  the  place  at  night.  Still,  the 
story  was  handed  down  from  one  to  another, 
and  the  place  was  shunned  as  much  as  possible. 

Brier  Crook  church  stood  at  one  end,  with 
its  desolate  little  graveyard,  where  the  colored 
people  buried  their  dead  under  its  weeping 
willows  and  gloomy  cedars. 

John  Jay  avoided  the  lonely  road  that  led  in 
that  direction,  and  took  the  one  that  wound 
around  the  other  end  of  the  thicket,  past  a  de- 


72  OLE    MAMMY  S.   TORMENT. 

serted  mill.  Yet,  when  he  reached  the  ruined 
old  building,  with  its  staring  windows  and 
sunken  roof,  he  was  half  sorry  that  he  had  not 
gone  the  other  way. 

The  berries  were  on  the  far  side  of  the 
thicket,  and  he  was  obliged  to  pass  either 
the  graveyard  or  the  old  mill  to  reach  them. 
The  possibility  of  plunging  boldly  into  the 
thicket  and  pushing  his  way  through  to  the 
other  side  had  never  occurred  to  him,  although 
it  is  doubtful  if  he  would  have  dared  to  do  so 
even  had  he  thought  of  it.  He  ran  down  the 
dry  bed  of  the.  stream,  and  past  the  silent  moss- 
grown  wheel,  breathing  a  sigh  of  relief  when  he 
came  out  into  an  open  field  beyond. 

Balancing  himself  on  the  top  rail  of  the 
fence,  he  looked  cautiously  along  the  edge  of 
the  thicket.  It  did  not  look  so  dismal  in  there, 
after  all.  A  woodpecker's  cheerful  tapping 
sounded  somewhere  within.  Butterflies  flitted 
fearlessly  down  into  its  shady  ravines.  A 
squirrel  ran  out  on  a  limb,  and  sat  chattering 
at  him  saucily.  Then  a  big  gray  rabbit  rustled 
through  the  leaves,  and  went  loping-  away  into 
the  depths  of  the  thicket. 

"  I  don't  believe  there's  anyt'iing  skc*eiy  in 


OLE    MAMMY  S    TORMENT.  73 

there  at  all !  "  exclaimed  John  Jay  aloud.  After 
starting  several  times,  and  stopping  to  look  all 
around  and  listen,  he  followed  the  rabbit  into 
the  bushes.  Plunging  clown  a  narrow  cow- 
path  which  wound  in  and  out,  he  came  to  an 
open  space  where  a  few  trees  had  fallen.  Here, 
with  an  exclamation  of  delight,  he  pounced  upon 
the  finest,  largest  berries  he  had  ever  seen. 
They  dropped  into  the  tin  pail  with  a  noisy 
thud  at  first,  and  then  with  scarcely  a  sound,  as 
they  rapidly  piled  higher  and  higher. 

Both  pails  were  filled  in  a  much  shorter  time 
than  usual,  and  then  he  sat  down  on  a  wide  log 
to  enjoy  the  lunch  he  had  brought  with  him. 
Th^re  were  two  big  slices  of  bread  and  jam  in 
one  pocket,  and  a  big  apple  in  the  other.  As 
he  sat  there,  slowly  munching,  he  began  to 
feel  drowsy.  He  had  awakened  early  that 
morning,  and  had  worked  hard  in  the  hot  sun. 
He  stretched  himself  out  full  length  on  the 
log,  to  rest  his  back  while  he  finished  eating 
his  apple. 

The  branches  overhead  swayed  gently  back 
and  forth.  His  eyes  followed  them  as  they 
kept  up  that  slow,  monotonous  motion  against 
the  bright  sky.  He  had  no  intention  of 


74  OLE  MAMMY'S  TORMENT. 

closing  them;  in  fact,  he  did  not  know  they 
were  closed,  for  in  that  same  moment  he  was 
sound  asleep. 

The  woodpecker  went  on  tapping  ;  the  squir- 
rel whisked  back  and  forth  along  the  limb ;  the 
same  gray  rabbit  came  out  and  hopped  along 
beside  the  log  where  he  lay.  Suddenly,  it 
raised  itself  up  to  look  at  the  strange  sight, 
and  then  bounded  away  again.  The  sun 
dropped  lower  and  lower.  In  the  open  fields 
there  was  still  light,  but  the  thicket  was  gray 
with  the  subdued  shadows  of  the  gloaming. 

John  Jay  might  have  slept  on  all  night  had 
not  a  leaf  fluttered  slowly  down  from  the  tree 
above,  and  brushed  across  his  face.  He  opened 
his  eyes,  looking  all  around  him  in  a  bewildered 
way.  Then  he  sat  up,  and  peered  through  the 
bushes.  A  cold  perspiration  covered  him  when 
he  realized  that  it  was  dusk  and  that  he  was  in 
the  middle  of  the  gander  thicket.  He  snatched 
up  the  blackberries,  a  pail  in  each  hand,  and 
stood  looking  helplessly  around  him,  for  he 
could  not  decide  which  way  to  go.  In  front 
of  him  stretched  half  a  mile  of  the  haunted 
thicket.  It  was  either  to  push  his  way  through 
that  as  quickly  as  possible,  or  to  go  back  by 


OLE    MAMMY  S    TORMENT.  75 

the  long,  lonesome  road  over  which  he  had 
come. 

Just  then  a  harmless  flock  of  geese  belong- 
ing to  an  old  market-gardener  who  lived  near 
came  waddling  up  from  the  creek,  on  the  way 
home  to  their  barn-yard.  They  moved  along 
in  a  silent  procession,  pushing  their  long,  thin 
necks  through  the  underbrush.  John  Jay  was 
too  terrified  to  see  that  their  heads  were  prop- 
erly in  place,  and  that  they  were  as  harmless  as 
the  flock  that  fed  in  Aunt  Susan's  dooryard. 

"They'll  get  me!  They'll  get  me!"  he 
whimpered,  as  they  came  nearer  and  nearer, 
for  his  feet  seemed  so  heavy  that  he  could 
not  lift  them  when  he  tried  to  run.  Made 
desperate  by  his  fear,  he  raised  first  one  pail 
of  berries  and  then  the  other,  hurling  them  at 
the  startled  geese  with  all  the  force  his  wiry 
little  arms  could  muster. 

Instantly  their  long  white  wings  shot  up 
through  the  bushes.  There  was  an  angry 
fluttering  and  hissing,  as  half  running,  half 
flying,  they  waddled  faster  towards  home.  John 
Jay  did  not  look  to  see  what  direction  they  were 
taking.  He  was  sure  they  were  after  him. 
He  could  hear  their  long  wings  flapping  just 


76  OLE  MAMMY'S  TORMENT. 

behind  him  ;  at  least,  he  thought  he  could,  but 
the  noise  he  heard  was  the  snapping  of  the 
twigs  he  trampled  in  his  headlong  flight.  No 
greyhound  ever  bounded  through  a  wood  with 
lighter  feet  than  those  which  carried  him.  His 
eyes  were  wide  with  fright.  His  heart  beat  so 
hard  in  his  throat  he  thought  he  would  surely 
die  before  he  could  reach  the  cabin.  At  every 


step  the  light  seemed  to  be  growing  dimmer 
and  the  thicket  denser,  although  he  thought 
he  certainly  must  have  been  running  long 
-enough  to  have  reached  the  clearing.  Still 
he  ran  on,  and  on,  and  on.  The  recollection 
of  one  of  Mammy's  stories  flashed  across  his 
mind. 

Once  a  man  had  lost  his  way  in  this  wood, 
and  the  ganders  had  chased  him  around  and 
around  until  daylight.  The  thought  made  him 


OLE  MAMMY'S  TORMENT.  77 

so  weak  in  the  knees  that  he  was  ready  to  drop 
from  fright  and  exhaustion.  Then  he  recalled 
a  superstition  that  he  had  often  heard,  that  any- 
one who  has  lost  his  way  may  find  it  again  by 
turning  his  pocket  wrong  side  out.  He  was 
twitching  at  his  with  trembling  hands,  look 
ing  with  eyes  too  frightened  to  see,  and  fum- 
bling with  fingers  too  stiff  with  fear  to  feel, 
but  the  pocket  seemed  to  have  disappeared. 
"It's  conju'ed  too,"  he  wailed,  as  he  ran  heed- 
lessly on. 

Something  long  and  white  slapped  across  his 
face.  An  unearthly,  wavering  voice  sounded  a 
hoarse,  long-drawn  "  Moo-oo-oo !  "  just  in  front 
of  him.  He  sank  down  in  a  helpless  little  heap, 
blubbering  and  groaning  aloud,  with  his  teeth 
chattering,  and  the  tears  running  down  his 
clammy  face.  There  was  a  louder  crackling, 
and  out  of  the  bushes  walked  an  old  spotted 
cow,  calmly  switching  her  white  tail  and  look- 
ing at  John  Jay  in  gentle-eyed  wonder. 

Strength  came  back  to  the  boy  with  that 
familiar  sight,  but  not  being  sure  that  the  cow 
was  not  as  ghostly  as  "the  ganders,  he  scram- 
bled to  his  feet  and  started  to  run  again.  To 
avoid  passing  the  cow,  he  turned  in  another 


78  OLE  MAMMY'S  TORMENT. 

direction.  This  time,  it  happened  to  be  the 
right  one,  and  in  a  few  moments  more  he  had 
dashed  into  the  open.  Then  he  saw  that  it  was 
not  yet  dark  in  the  fields. 

Mammy  heard  the  sound  of  rapid  running 
up  the  path,  and  came  to  the  door.  John 
Jay  dropped  at  her  feet,  trembling  and  cold,  and 
so  .frightened  that  he  could  only  cling  to  her 
skirts,  sobbing  piteously.  When,  at  last,  he 
found  his  breath,  all  he  could  gasp  was,  "  Oh, 
Mammy !  the  gandahs  are  aftah  me !  the  gan- 
dahs  are  aftah  me  !  " 

Big  boy  as  he  was,  Mammy  stooped  and 
lifted  him  in  her  arms,  and  holding  him  close, 
with  his  head  on  her  shoulder,  rocked  back  and 
forth  in  the  big  wooden  chair  until  he  grew 
calmer.  Not  until  he  had  sobbed  out  the  whole 
story,  and  wiped  his  eyes  several  times  on  her 
apron,  did  he  see  that  there  was  company  in  the 
room. 

George  Chadwick  was  sitting  by  the  door. 
It  was  the  first  time  he  had  been  in  the  cabin 
since  his  return  from  college.  He  had  ridden 
up  from  the  toll-gate  on  a  passing  wagon  to 
see  his  old  friend,  Sheba,  and  had  been  there 
the  greater  part  of  the  afternoon,  listening  to 


OLE  MAMMY'S  TORMENT.  79 

her  tales  of  his  mother  in  the  old  slavery  days. 
He  had  not  intended  to  accept  her  urgent  invita- 
tion to  stay  to  supper,  but  when  he  saw  that  she 
shared  John  Jay's  fright,  he  decided  to  remain. 
Had  it  not  been  for  his  protecting  presence  in 
the  house,  Mammy  was  so  affected  by  the  boy's 
story  that  she  would  have  barred  every  open- 
ing. Then,  cowering  around  one  little  flicker- 
ing candle,  they  would  have  fed  each  other's 
superstitious  fears  until  bedtime.  George  knew 
this,  and  so  he  stayed  to  reassure  them  by  his 
matter-of-fact  explanations,  and  his  cheerful 
common  sense.  While  he  could  not  convince 
them  that  they  had  been  needlessly  alarmed,  he 
drew  their  attention  to  other  things,  by  stories 
of  college  life  and  experiences  at  the  North, 
while  Sheba  bustled  about,  bringing  out  the 
best  of  her  meagre  store  to  do  him  honor. 

Ivy,  scrubbed  until  she  shone,  and  in  a  stiffly 
starched  apron,  sat  on  his  knee  and  sucked  her 
thumb.  Bud  squatted  at  his  feet  in  silence, 
sticking  his  little  red  tongue  in  and  out  of  the 
hole  where  the  lost  tooth  had  been.  As  for 
John  Jay,  his  hero-worship  passed  that  night 
into  warmest  love.  From  that  time  on,  he 
would  have  gone  through  fire  and  water  to 


8o  OLE  MAMMY'S  TORMENT. 

serve  his  "  Rev'und  Gawge," -- anywhere  in 
fact,  save  one  place.  Never  any  more  was 
there  motive  deep  enough  or  power  strong 
enough  to  drag  him  within  calling  distance  of 
the  gander  thicket. 


CHAPTER   VII. 

Now  that  berry  picking  was  at  an  end,  John 
Jay  slipped  back  into  his  old  lazy  ways.  Er- 
rands were  run  with  lagging  feet ;  work  was 
done  in  the  easiest  way  possible,  and  every- 
thing was  left  undone  that  he  could  by  any 
means  avoid.  Mammy  scolded  when  she  came 
home  at  night  and  found  both  water-pail  and 
wood-box  empty,  but  he  went  serenely  on  with 
his  supper.  No  matter  what  happened,  nothing 
ever  interfered  with  his  appetite. 

"Those  chillun  are  gettin'  as  bad  as  little 
young  turkeys  'bout  strayin'  away  from  home," 
mumbled  Aunt  Susan  one  morning,  as  she 
watched  them  slip  through  the  fence  soon 
after  Sheba  had  left  the  house.  "  An'  they 
ain't  anything  wussah  than  young  turkeys  for 
runnin'  off.  'Peahs  like  that  kind  of  poultry 
is  nevah  satisfied  with  where  they  is,  but  always 
want  to  be  where  they  isn't.  It's  the  same  with 
those  chillun." 

81 


82  OLE  MAMMY'S  TORMENT. 

Although  Aunt  Susan  did  not  know  it,  the**-, 
was  one  place  where  John  Jay  and  his  flock  of 
two  were  always  content  to  stay ;  that  was  on 
the  steps  at  the  side  door  of  the  church.  Nearly 
every  afternoon  found  them  sitting  there  in  a 
solemn  row,  waiting  for  the  shadows  to  grow 
long  across  the  grass,  for  it  was  then  that 
George  oftenest  came  to  play  on  the  organ. 
He  always  smiled  on  the  three  grave  little 
figures,  waiting  so  patiently  for  the  music  of 
his  vesper  hymns. 

It  touched  the  lonely  man  to  have  John  Jay 
follow  him  about,  with  that  same  wistful  look 
in  his  eyes  that  a  faithful  dog  has  for  its 
master.  Sometimes  he  sat  down  on  the  steps 
beside  the  children  and  talked  to  them  awhile, 
just  to  see  the  boy's  face  light  up  with  pleasure. 

It  was  a  mystery  to  Sheba,  how  a  dignified 
minister  could  care  for  the  companionship  of 
such  a  harum-scarum  little  creature  as  her 
grandson.  She  did  know  the  tie  that  bound 
them,  but  their  natures  were  as  near  akin  as 
the  acorn  and  the  oak.  In  John  Jay  the  man 
saw  his  own  childhood  with  all  its  unanswered 
questions  'and  dumb,  groping  ambitions  ;  while 
the  boy,  looking  up  to  his  "  Rev'und  Gawge  " 


OLE  MAMMY'S  TORMENT.  83 

as  the  highest  standard  of  all  manliness,  felt 
faint  stirrings  within,  of  the  possibility  of  such 
growth  for  himself. 

Early  one  morning  George  sent  a  message 
to  Sheba,  asking  that  John  Jay  might  be 
allowed  to  spend  the  day  with  him  and  help 
watch  the  toll-gate,  while  Mars'  Nat  was  in  town. 
That  morning  still  stands  out  in  the  boy's 
memory,  as  one  of  the  happiest  he  ever  spent. 

Along  in  the  middle  of  the  afternoon,  when 
travel  on  the  turnpike  had  almost  ceased  on 
account  of  the  heat,  George  went  into  his  room 
and  lay  down.  John  Jay  sat  on  the  floor  of 
the  porch,  holding  the  old  hound's  head  in  his 
lap,  and  lazily  smoothing  its  long  soft  ears. 
He  felt  very  important  when  a  wagon  rattled 
up  and  the  toll  was  dropped  into  his  ringers. 
He  wished  that  everybody  he  knew  would  ride 
by  and  find  him  sitting  there  in  charge ;  but 
no  one  else  came  for  more  than  an  hour.  It 
had  seemed  as  long  as  ten  hours,  with  nothing 
to  do  but  slap  at  the  flies  and  talk  to  the  sleepy 
hound.  John  Jay  grinned  when  he  saw  the 
arrival,  for  it  was  a  man  whom  he  knew. 

"  Good  evenin',  Mistah  Boden,"  he  called, 
eagerly.  The  man  stopped  his  horses. 


84  OLE  MAMMY'S  TORMENT. 

"  Hello  !  "  he  said.  "  You're  in  charge,  are 
you?  Where's  the  rest  of  the  folks?" 

"  Mars'  Nat,  he's  gone  to  town  to-day," 
answered  John  Jay,  proudly.  "  I'm  keepin' 
toll-gate  this  evenin',  Mistah  Boden." 

"  So  !  "  exclaimed  the  man,  with  a  cunning 
gleam  in  his  little  eyes.  "  That's  the  lay  of 
the  land,  is  it?" 

Instead  of  taking  out  his  pocket-book,  he 
threw  one  foot  over  his  knee,  and  began  to 
ask  questions  in  a  friendly  manner  that  flat- 
tered John  Jay. 

"  Let's  see.  Your  name's  Hickman,  hain't 
it  ?  " 

"Yessa,  John  Jay  Hickman,"  answered  the 
boy. 

"  Yes,"  drawled  the  man,  gnawing  at  a  plug 
of  tobacco  which  he  took  from  his  pocket.  "  I 
know  all  about  you.  Your  mammy  used  to 
cook  for  my  wife,  and  your  gran'mammy  washed 
at  our  house  one  summer.  How  is  the  old 
woman,  anyhow  ? " 

"  She's  well,  thank  you,  Mistah  Boden,"  was 
the  pleased  answer. 

"And  then  there's  that  brother  of  her's  — 
Billy !  old  Uncle  Billy  !  How's  he  getting  on  ? " 


OLE  MAMMY'S  TORMENT.  85 

"  Oh,  he's  mighty  complainin',  Mistah  Boden  ; 
he's  got  such  a  misery  in  his  back  all  the  time 
that  he  say  he  jus'  aint  got  ambition  'nuff  to 
get  out'n  his  own  way." 

"  Is  that  so  ? "  was  the  reply,  in  a  tone  of 
flattering  interest.  The  man  beckoned  him 
with  his  whip  to  step  closer. 

"  Look  here,  boy,"  he  said,  in  a  confidential 
tone,  "it's  a  mighty  lucky  thing  for  me  that 
Nat  Chadwick  left  you  here  instead  of  a 
stranger.  Every  penny  of  change  I  started 
with  this  morning  dropped  out  through  a  hole 
in  my  pocket  somewhere.  I  didn't  find  it  out 
until  I  got  within  sight  of  the  place  ;  then, 
thinks  I  to  myself,  'oh,  it  won't  make  any  dif- 
ference. Nat  and  I  are  old  friends ;  he'll  pass 
me.'  I  guess  you  can  do  the  same,  can't  you, 
being  as  you're  in  his  place,  and  I'm  an  old 
friend  of  your  family  ?  You  needn't  say  any- 
thing about  it,  and  I'll  do  as  much  for  you 
some  day." 

John  Jay  looked  puzzled.  Before  he  could 
reply  George  walked  out  on  the  porch  and 
stood  beside  him.  He  bowed  to  the  man 
politely.  "  I'll  take  the  toll,  if  you  please, 
Mr.  Boden.  Put  up  the  bar,  John." 


86  OLE  MAMMY'S  TORMENT. 

The  man  hesitated  a  moment,  then  tossed 
him  the  change,  and  gave  the  horses  a  cut 
with  his  whip  that  sent  them  dashing  down 
the  road. 

"If  he  wasn't  jus'  tryin'  to  sneak  his  way 
through  'thout  payin' !  "  exclaimed  John  Jay, 
indignantly.  George  made  no  comment,  but 
John  Jay  seemed  unable  to  quit  talking  about 
the  occurrence.  Half  an  hour  later  he  broke 
out  again :  "  He  thought  'cause  I  was  jus'  a 
little  boy  he  could  cheat  me,  an'  nobody  would 
evah  know  the  difference.  I  nevah  in  all  my 
life  befo'  heard  tell  of  anything  so  mean  !  " 

"Haven't  you?"  asked  George,  with  such 
peculiar  emphasis  and  such  a  queer  little  smile 
that  John  Jay  felt  guilty,  although  he  could  not 
have  told  why. 

"  No,  I  nevah  did,"  he  insisted. 

George  leaned  against  the  door-casing,  and 
looked  thoughtfully  across  the  fields.  "  There 
are  more  turnpikes  in  life  than  one,  my  boy," 
he  said  kindly,  "  and  every  one  has  its  toll-gate. 
There  is  the  road  to  learning.  I  gave  up  every- 
thing to  get  through  that  gate,  even  my  health. 
One  cannot  be  anything  or  do  anything  worth 
while  without  paying  some  sort  of  toll.  It  may 


OLE  MAMMY'S  TORMENT.  87 

be  time  or  strength  or  hard  work  or  patience, 
and  sometimes  we  have  to  give  them  all." 

"  Teahs  like  I've  nevah  struck  airy  such 
roads  in  my  travelling''  answered  John  Jay, 
carelessly,  who  often  understood  George's  little 
parables  far  better  than  he  cared  to  acknowl- 
edge. 

"But  I  know  one  road  that  you  are  on  now, 
where  you  try  to  slip  out  of  paying  what  you 
owe  every  day." 

John  Jay  hung  his  head,  and  rubbed  his  bare 
feet  together  in  embarrassed  silence.  If  the 
Reverend  George  said  it  was  so,  it  must  be  so, 
although  he  did  not  know  just  what  he  was 
hinting  at. 

"  Mr.  Boden  knows  very  well,"  continued 
George,  "  that  the  money  that  is  paid  here  goes 
to  keep  the  road  in  good  condition  for  him  to 
travel  over.  He  is  very  glad  to  have  such  a 
good  pike  provided  for  him,  but  he  wants  it  for 
nothing.  I  know  a  pjoor  old  woman  who  keeps 
the  road  smooth  for  somebody.  She  works 
early  and  late,  in  hot  weather  and  cold,  to  earn 
food  and  shelter  and  clothes  for  somebody ; 
and  that  somebody  eats  her  bread,  and  wears 
out  the  clothes,  and  sleeps  under  her  roof,  and 


88  OLE  MAMMY'S  TORMENT. 

never  pays  any  toll.  He  owes  her  thanks  and 
willing  service,  —  all  the  help  he  can  give  her 
poor,  tired  old  body,  but  she  never  gets  even 
the  thanks.  He  takes  all  her  drudgery  as  a 
matter  of  course." 

John  Jay's  head  dropped  lower  and  lower,  as 
he  screwed  his  toes  around  in  the  dust  of  the 
path,  mortified  and  embarrassed.  All  the  whip- 
pings of  his  life  had  never  stung  him  so  deeply 
as  George's  quiet  words.  He  was  used  to  be- 
ing scolded  for  his  laziness.  He  never  paid 
any  attention  to  that ;  but  to  have  his  "  Rev- 
'und  Gawge"  regard  him  as  dishonest  as  Mr. 
Boden  hurt  him  more  than  words  could  express. 

Another  wagon  came  rattling  up  in  a  cloud 
of  dust.  Without  waiting  to  see  the  new- 
comer, he  dodged  around  the  corner  of  the 
house  and  ran  down  to  the  barn.  A  pair  of 
puppies  came  frisking  out  ready  for  a  romp, 
and  an  old  Maltese  cat,  stretched  out  in  the 
sun,  stood  up  and  arched  its  back  at  his  ap- 
proach. He  took  no  notice  of  them,  but  crawl- 
ing up  into  the  hay,  threw  himself  down  in  a 
dark  corner  with  his  face  hidden  in  his  arms. 

Mars'  Nat  came  home  after  awhile.  John 
Jay  could  hear  Ned  putting  the  horse  into  the 


OLE  MAMMY'S  TORMENT.  89 

stall,  and  throwing  the  corn  into  the  feed-box. 
Then  everything  was  still  for  a  long  time. 
The  sun  stole  through  the  cracks  of  the  barn 
in  wide  shining  streaks,  with  little  motes  of 
dust  dancing  up  and  down  in  the  golden  light, 
but  John  Jay  did  not  see  them.  A  shadow 
darkened  the  doorway.  He  did  not  see  that, 
for  his  face  was  still  hidden.  There  was  a 
step  on  the  barn  floor,  and  a  rustling  in  the 
hay  beside  him  ;  then  George's  hand  rested 
lightly  on  his  head,  and  his  voice  said,  sooth- 
ingly, "  There,  there  !  I  wouldn't  cry  about  it." 

"  Oh,  I  nevah  thought  about  things  that  way 
befo'  !  "  sobbed  John  Jay.  "  I'll  nevah  sneak 
out  of  the  work  again.  I'll  tote  the  wood  and 
watah  'thout  waitin'  to  be  asked,  an'  I'll  nevah 
lick  out  my  tongue  at  her  behine  her  back  as 
long  as  I  live !  " 

George  bit  his  lips  to  keep  from  laughing, 
although  he  was  touched  by  the  little  penitent's 
distress. 

"  Do  you  know  why  I  said  such  hard  things 
to  you  ? "  he  asked.  "  It  was  to  open  your 
eyes.  I  want  to  make  a  man  of  you,  John  Jay. 
Let  me  tell  you  some  things  about  your  grand- 
mother that  you  have  never  heard.  Her  whole 


90  OLE    MAMMY  S    TORMENT. 

life  has  been  a  struggle,  and  such  a  very  sad 
one." 

John  Jay  rubbed  his  shirt  sleeve  across  his 
eyes  and  gave  a  final  snuffle.  Some  people 
never  have  the  awakening  that  came  to  him 
that  afternoon.  Some  people  go  along  all  their 
days  with  no  other  thought  in  life  than  to 
burrow  through  their  own  mole-hills.  There 
in  the  hay,  with  the  shining  dust  of  the  sun- 
beams falling  athwart  the  old  barn  floor,  the 
boy  lay  and  listened.  Thoughts  that  he  had 
no  words  for,  ambitions  that  he  could  not  ex- 
press, yet  that  filled  him  with  vague  longing, 
seemed  to  vibrate  along  the  earnest  voice,  and 
tremble  from  the  fulness  of  George's  heart  into 
his.  Even  after  George  stopped  talking  and 
began  to  whistle  softly  in  the  pause  that  fol- 
lowed, John  Jay  lay  quite  still  with  his  face 
hidden  in  his  arms. 

Ned  came  in  presently,  rustling  around 
through  the  hay  after  eggs,  and  singing  at  the 
top  of  his  voice.  The  sound  seemed  to  bring 
John  Jay  back  to  his  common  every-day  self. 
He  sat  up,  grinning  as  if  he  had  never  heard 
of  such  things  as  tears  ;  but  those  he  had  shed 
must  have  made  his  eyesight  clearer.  As  he 


OLE    MAMMY  S    TORMENT.  9! 

slid  down  from  the  hay  and  walked  along  beside 
George,  he  noticed  for  the  first  time  how  slow 
and  faltering  the  steps  beside  his  had  grown. 
As  they  climbed  up  the  hill  to  the  church,  it 
seemed  to  him  that  the  beloved  face  looked 
unusually  thin  and  haggard  in  the  strong  light 
of  the  sunset. 

George  did  not  play  long  this  evening.  He 
knew  that  the  quiet  little  listener  on  the  steps 
bent  as  readily  to  the  changing  moods  of  his 
melody  as  the  clover  does  to  the  fitful  breezes  ; 
so  he  changed  abruptly  from  the  minor  chords 
that  his  fingers  instinctively  reached  for,  to  an 
old  hymn  that  smoothed  away  the  pathetic 
pucker  of  the  boy's  forehead.  Then  he  pulled 
out  the  stops  and  began  a  loud  burst  of  martial 
music,  so  glad  and  triumphant,  that,  listening, 
one  felt  all  great  things  possible  of  achieve- 
ment. John  Jay  stood  up,  swinging  his  cap  on 
the  end  of  a  stick  which  he  carried,  with  all  the 
curves  and  rythmic  motions  of  a  drum  major. 

After  George  came  out  and  locked  the  door, 
he  stood  for  a  moment  looking  out  fondly 
across  the  peaceful  fields,  still  fair  with  the 
fading  glow  of  the  summer  sun.  John  Jay 
looked  too,  feeling  at  the  same  time  the  touch 


92  OLE  MAMMY'S  TORMENT. 

of  a  caressing  hand  laid  lightly  on  his  bare 
head,  but  he  could  not  see  the  lips  above  him 
that  moved  in  a  silent  benediction. 

When  Mammy  came  home  that  night,  there 
was  wood  in  the  box  and  water  in  the  pail. 
The  loose  boards  lying  around  the  yard  had 
been  piled  up  neatly,  and  the  paths  were  freshly 
swept.  All  that  evening  John  Jay's  eyes  fol- 
lowed her  with  curious  glances  whichever  way 
she  turned,  as  if  he  found  her  changed.  The 
change  was  in  John  Jay. 

Next  day,  when  she  came  home,  she  found 
the  same  state  of  affairs.  It  was  early  in  the 
afternoon,  and  the  children  were  out  playing. 
She  hung  up  her  sun-bonnet,  and  dropped 
wearily  down  into  a  chair.  Then,  remembering 
a  pile  of  clothes  that  must  be  mended  before 
dark,  she  got  up  and  began  to  hunt  for  her 
thimble  and  thread. 

"That  tawmentin'  boy  must  have  lost  'em," 
she  exclaimed,  after  a  vain  search  through  her 
work-basket.  The  clothes  were  lying  on  the 
bed  where  she  had  put  them.  As  she  gathered 
them  in  her  arms  the  thimble  rolled  out,  and  a 
spool  of  thread  with  a  needle  sticking  in  it  fell 
to  the  floor. 


OLE  MAMMY'S  TORMENT.  95 

She  shook  out  Ivy's  little  blue  dress,  and 
began  turning  it  around  to  find  the  seam  that 
was  ripped.  It  was  drawn  together  with  queer 
straggling  stitches  that  only  the  most  awkward 
of  fingers  could  have  made.  The  white  buttons 
on  Bud's  shirt-waist  had  been  sewed  on  with 
black  thread,  and  a  spot  of  blood  told  where 
somebody's  thumb  had  felt  the  sharp  thrust  of 
a  needle.  John  Jay's  trousers  lay  at  the  bottom 
of  the  pile,  with  a  little  round,  puckered  patch 
of  calico  on  each  knee. 

The  tears  came  into  Mammy's  eyes  as  she 
saw  the  boy's  poor  attempt  to  help.  "I'se 
afeerd  he's  goin'  to  die,"  she  muttered  in  alarm. 
"  I  sut'n'ly  is.  Poah  little  fellow  :  he's  mighty 
tryin'  to  a  body's  patience  sometimes,  an'  he's 
made  a  mess  of  this  mendin',  for  suah,  but  I 
reckon  he  means  all  right.  He's  not  so  on- 
thinkin'  an'  onthankful  aftah  all."  She  laid  the 
spool  and  thimble  on  the  window-sill,  and  folded 
her  hands  to  rest  awhile.  There  was  a  tremu- 
lous smile  on  her  careworn  old  face.  For  one 
day,  at  >ast,  John  Jay  had  paid  his  toll. 


CHAPTER   VIII. 

BOYS  do  not  grow  into  saints  in  a  single 
night,  in  the  way  that  Jack's  beanstalk  grew 
from  earth  to  sky.  Sainthood  comes  slowly, 
like  the  blossom  on  a  century  plant ;  there 
must  be  a  hundred  years  of  thorny  stem-life  first. 

Mammy  soon  lost  all  her  fears  of  John  Jay's 
dying.  Although  the  promise  made  to  George 
on  the  haymow  was  faithfully  kept,  he  could 
no  more  avoid  getting '  into  mischief  than  a 
weathercock  can  keep  from  turning  when  the 
wind  blows. 

The  October  frosts  came,  sweetening  the 
persimmons  and  ripening  the  nuts  in  the  hazel 
copse ;  but  it  nipped  the  children's  bare  feet, 
and  made  the  thinly  clad  little  shoulders  shiver. 
John  Jay  gladly  shuffled  into  the  old  clothes 
sent  over  from  Rosehaven.  They  were  many 
sizes  too  big,  but  he  turned  back  the  coat 
sleeves  and  hitched  up  his  suspenders,  regard- 
less of  appearances.  Bud  fared  better,  for 
96 


OLE    MAMMY  S    TORMENT.  97 

the  suit  that  fell  to  his  lot  was  but  slightly 
worn,  and  almost  fitted  him.  As  for  Ivy,  she 
was  decked  out  in  such  finery  that  the  boys 
scarcely  dared  to  touch  her.  She  had  been 
given  a  long  blue  velvet  cloak  that  the  young- 
est Haven  could  no  longer  squeeze  into.  It 
was  trimmed  with  shaggy  fur  that  had  once 
been  white.  Ivy  admired  it  so  much  that  when 
she  was  not  wearing  it  out  of  doors  she  was 
carrying  it  around  in  the  house  in  a  big  roll,  as 
tenderly  as  if  it  had  been  a  great  doll. 

It  was  an  odd  little  procession  that  filed  past 
Uncle  Billy's  house  every  day,  on  the  way  to 
the  woods  for  autumn  stores.  John  Jay  came 
first,  with  a  rickety  wagon  he  had  made  out  of 
a  soap-box  and  two  solid  wooden  wheels.  He 
looked  like  a  little  old  man,  with  his  long  coat 
and  turned  up  trowsers.  Bud  came  next  in 
his  new  suit,  but  he  had  lost  his  hat,  and  was 
obliged  to  wear  a  handkerchief  tied  over  his 
ears.  Ivy  brought  up  the  rear,  continually 
tripping  on  her  long  cloak,  and  jolting  her 
white  toboggan  cap  down  over  her  eyes  at 
almost  every  step. 

Nuts  and  persimmons  and  wild  fox-grapes 
filled  the  little  wagon  many  times,  and  made 


98  OLE  MAMMY'S  TORMENT. 

a  welcome  addition  to  Mammy's  meagre  bill 
of  fare. 

Late  one  evening  John  Jay  came  running  up 
the  path  all  out  of  breath.  The  yellow  candle- 
light streamed  out  through  the  cabin  window. 
He  stopped  and  looked  in,  sniffing  the  air  with 
keen  enjoyment,  for  Mammy  was  stewing  the 
rabbit  he  had  caught  that  morning  in  a  snare. 

He  could  see  Bud  sitting  on  the  floor,  with 
his  feet  harnessed  up  as  horses.  He  was  saw- 
ing the  reins  back  and  forth  and  remorselessly 
switching  his  own  legs  until  they  flew  up  and 
down  in  fine  style.  John  Jay  watched  him 
with  a  grin  on  his  face. 

Presently  Mammy,  turning  to  season  the 
stew,  saw  the  black  face  pressed  close  against 
the  window-pane.  With  a  startled  shriek  she 
gave  the  pepper-pot  such  a  shake  that  the  lid 
flew  off,  and  nearly  all  of  the  pepper  went  into 
the  stew. 

"  Jus'  see  what  you  done  ! "  she  scolded,  as 
John  Jay  walked  into  the  house  an  instant 
later.  "  Next  time  you  come  gawkin'  in  the 
window  at  me  in  the  dark,  I'll  peppah  you 
'stid  o'  the  rabbit!" 

John  Jay  hastened  to   change   the   subject. 


OLE    MAMMY  S    TORMENT.  99 

"  I  sole  a  bushel  of  -  hickory  nuts  to  Mistah 
Bemis  jus'  now,"  he  stammered,  "  an'  he's 
goin'  to  take  some  mo'  next  week.  I'm  savin' 
up  to  get  you  all  somethin'  mighty  nice  for 
Chrismus."  He  jingled  his  pockets  sugges- 
tively ;  but  Mammy  was  too  busy  skimming 
the  pepper  out  of  the  stew  to  make  any 
reply. 

One  warm,  mellow  afternoon  when  the  gold- 
en-rod was  at  its  sunniest,  and  the  iron-weed 
flaunted  its  royal  purple  across  the  fields  in  the 
trail  of  the  Indian  summer,  John  Jay  went  down 
to  the  toll-gate  cottage.  He  found  his  Rever- 
end George  sitting  on  the  porch  in  his  over- 
coat, with  a  shawl  thrown  over  his  knees.  A 
book  lay  in  his  lap,  but  his  hands  were  folded 
on  the  open  pages,  and  he  was  looking  far  away 
across  the  brown  fields  of  tattered  corn-stalks. 
He  was  much  better  than  he  had  been  for  sev- 
eral weeks,  and  welcomed  John  Jay  so  gaily, 
that  the  child  felt  that  a  weight  had  somehow 
been  lifted  from  him.  Mammy  and  Uncle  Billy 
had  been  whispering  together  many  times  of 
late,  and  the  little  listener  shared  their  fears. 
He  had  made  so  many  visits  to  the  toll-gate 


ioo  OLE  MAMMY'S  TORMENT. 

since  the  day  he  was  left  in  charge,  that  he  felt 
almost  as  much  at  home  there  as  Mars'  Nat 
himself.  Once  George  did  all  the  talking  while 
John  Jay  listened  with  his  head  bashfully  tipped 
to  one  side ;  now  they  seemed  to  have  changed 
places.  It  was  George  who  listened. 

John  Jay  had  been  kept  at  home  for  several 
days,  and  had  much  to  tell.  For  an  hour  or 
more  he  entertained  George  with  accounts  of 
his  rabbit  snares,  his  nutting  expeditions,  and 
his  persimmon  hunts.  He  told  about  the  dye 
Mammy  had  made  from  the  sumach  berries 
which  he  had  carried  home,  and  how  Ivy  had 
dropped  her  pet  duck  into  it.  He  imitated 
Bud's  antics  when  he  upset  the  kettle  of  soft 
soap,  and  he  had  much  to  say  about  the  young 
owl  which  they  had  caught,  and  caged  under  a 
wash-tub. 

He  did  not  notice  that  he  was  doing  all  the 
talking  this  afternoon,  but  rilled  the  pauses  that 
sometimes  fell  between  them  by  idly  playing 
jack-stones  with  a  handful  of  acorns.  George 
was  thinking  as  they  sat  there  that  this  might 
be  the  last  time  that  they  two  would  ever  sit 
in  this  way  together,  and  he  was  searching  for 
some  words  with  which  to  prepare  the  child  for 


OLE    MAMMY  S    TORMENT.  IOI 

a  sudden  leave-taking  in  case  it  should  be 
soon. 

At  last  he  cleared  his  throat.  John  Jay 
looked  up  expectantly,  but  just  then  Mars'  Nat 
walked  around  the  house. 

"  Here  comes  Doctor  Leonard,"  he  said,  nod- 
ding towards  a  rapidly  approaching  horseman. 
"  Howdy,  Doc,"  he  called,  as  the  man  drew 
rein,  and  felt  in  his  pocket  for  some  change 
to  pay  his  toll.  "  What's  your  hurry  ?  " 

"  I've  a  call  over  to  Elk  Ridge,"  he  answered, 
handing  him  the  money  and  quickly  starting  on. 
Then  he  pulled  his  horse  up  with  a  sudden  jerk. 
"  Here,  Chadwick,"  he  called,  pitching  the  heavy 
overcoat  he  carried  on  his  arm  in  the  direction  of 
the  porch,  "I  wish  you'd  keep  this  for  me 
until  I  get  back.  I'll  be  along  this  way  before 
dark,  and  it's  so  much  warmer  than  I  thought  it 
would  be  that  such  a  heavy  coat  is  a  nuisance." 

"All  right,"  responded  the  toll-keeper. 
"Here!  John  Jay,"  he  ordered,  as  the  doctor 
disappeared  around  the  bend  in  the  road,  "  pick 
up  the  gentleman's  coat  and  hang  it  on  a  chair 
inside  the  door  there."  Then  he  stuck  his 
hands  in  his  pockets,  and  whistling  to  his  dog, 
walked  off  across  the  fields. 


102  OLE    MAMMY  S    TORMENT. 

George  turned  to  the  child  again.  "John 
Jay,"  he  said,  "  do  you  know  that  I'm  going 
away  soon  ?  "  Without  waiting  for  an  answer, 
he  hurried  on,  lest  another  spell  of  coughing 
should  interrupt  him.  "  When  I  was  a  little 
fellow  like  you  I  heard  so  much  about  spirits 
and  graveyards  and  haunted  places  that  I  had 
a  horror  of  dying.  I  could  not  think  of  it  with- 
out a  shiver.  But  I've  found  out  that  death 
isn't  a  cold,  ugly  thing,  my  boy,  and  I  want  you 
to  remember  all  your  life  every  word  I'm  say- 
ing to  you  now.  There  is  nothing  to  dread  in 
simply  going  down  this  road  and  through  the 
gate  as  Doctor  Leonard  did,  and  death  is  no 
more  than  that.  We  just  go  down  the  turnpike 
till  we  get  to  the  end  of  this  life,  and  then 
there's  the  toll-gate.  We  lay  down  our  old 
worn-out  bodies,  just  as  Doctor  Leonard  left 
his  coat  here,  because  he  wouldn't  need  it  far- 
ther up  the  road.  Then  the  bar  flies  up  and 
lets  us  through.  It  drops  so  quickly  that  no 
one  ever  sees  what  lies  on  the  other  side,  but 
we  know  that  there  is  neither  sorrow  nor  cry- 
ing beyond  it,  nor  any  more  pain.  Listen, 
John  Jay,  this  is  what  the  Book  tells  us." 

With  fingers  that  trembled  in  his  eagerness 


OLE    MAMMY  S    TORMENT.  1 03 

to  make  himself  understood,  he  lifted  the  vol- 
ume that  had  been  lying  in  his  lap.  The  words 
that  he  read  vibrated  through  the  child's  heart 
in  the  way  that  the  organ  music  used  to  roll. 
Never  again  in  the  years  that  followed  could 
he  hear  them  read  without  seeing  all  the  golden 
glory  of  that  radiant  October  day,  and  hearing 
the  mournful  notes  of  some  distant  dove,  falling 
at  intervals  through  the  Sabbath-like  stillness. 

He  had  a  queer  conception  of  what  lies 
beyond  the  gates  of  this  life.  It  was  a  curious 
jumble  of  crowns  and  harps  and  long,  white- 
feathered  wings.  Mammy's  favorite  song  said, 
"There's  milk  an'  honey  in  heaven,  I  know;" 
and  Aunt  Susan  often  lifted  up  her  cracked 
voice  in  the  refrain,  "  Oh,  them  golden  slippahs 
I'm  agvvine  to  wear,  when  Gabriel  blows  his 
t rum-pet ! "  How  Uncle  Billy  could  sigh  for 
the  time  to  come  when  he  might  walk  the 
shining  pavements  was  beyond  John  Jay's  un- 
derstanding. Personally,  he  preferred  the  free- 
dom of  the  neighboring  woods  and  the  pleasure 
of  digging  in  the  dirt  to  all  the  white  robes 
and  crowns  that  might  be  laid  up  somewhere  in 
the  skies. 

But  when  George  had  finished  reading,  John 


IO4  OLE  MAMMY'S  TORMENT. 

Jay  was  not  gazing  into  the  clouds  for  a  glimpse 
of  the  city  to  which  his  friend  was  going ;  he 
was  looking  down  the  road.  Crowned  with  all 
their  autumn  glory,  the  far  hills  stood  up  fair 
and  golden  in  the  westering  sun.  It  was  to 
some  place  just  as  real  and  beautiful  as  the 
hills  he  looked  upon  that  George  was  going, 
not  a  crowded  street  with  an  endless  procession 
of  singing,  white-robed  figures.  A  far  country, 
under  whose  waving  trees  health  and  strength 
would  be  given  back  to  him.  No,  dying  was 
not  a  cold,  ugly  thing. 

"  They  shall  obtain  joy  and  gladness,  and  sor- 
row and  sighing  sJiallflce  away  !  " 

George  closed  the  book,  and  leaning  wearily 
back  in  the  chair,  drew  his  hand  over  his  eyes. 
"  I  want  you  to  promise  me  one  thing,  John 
Jay,"  he  said.  "That  when  I  am  gone  you  will 
think  of  what  I  am  telling  you  now,  and  when 
the  colored  people  all  gather  around  to  see  this 
tired  body  of  mine  laid  aside,  you'll  remember 
Dr.  Leonard's  coat,  and  you'll  say,  '  George  has 
left  his  behind  too.  He  isn't  here,  but  he's  just 
on  the  other  side  of  the  toll-gate.'  Will  you  do 
that,  John  Jay  ?  " 

There  was  a   frightened   look    in   the  boy  s 


OLE    MAMMY  S    TORMENT.  105 

eyes.  He  had  no  words  wherewith  to  answer 
him,  but  he  nodded  an  assent  as  he  went  on 
nervously  tossing  the  acorns  from  one  hand  to 
another. 

There  was  a  long  silence,  and  when  he  looked 
up  inquiringly,  George  had  put  his  thin  hands 
over  his  face  to  hide  the  tears  that  were  slowly 
trickling  down. 

"  What's  the  mattah  ? "  he  asked  anxiously. 
"  Shall  I  call  Mars'  Nat  ?  " 

"  No,"  answered  the  man,  steadying  his  voice. 
"  I  was  only  thinking  that  I  had  expected  to  go 
through  the  gate,  when  my  turn  came,  with  my 
arms  piled  full  of  sheaves,  —  but  I've  come  to 
the  end  too  soon.  It  seems  so  hard  to  come 
down  to  death  empty-handed,  when  I  have 
longed  all  these  years  to  do  so  much  for  my 
people.  Oh,  my  poor  people ! "  he  cried  out 
desperately ;  "  so  helpless  and  so  needy,  and 
my  life  that  was  to  have  been  given  to  them 
going  out  in  vain  !  utterly  in  vain  !  " 

It  was  not  the  first  time  that  John  Jay  had 
heard  that  cry.  In  these  weeks  of  constant 
companionship  George  had  talked  so  much  of 
his  hopes  and  plans,  that  a  faint  spark  of  that 
same  ambition  had  begun  to  smoulder  slowly 


106  OLE  MAMMY'S  TORMENT. 

in  the  boy's  ignorant  little  heart.  Six  months 
ago  he  could  have  had  no  understanding  of-  such 
a  grief  as  now  made  George's  voice  to  tremble ; 
but  love  had  opened  his  eyes  to  many  things, 
and  made  his  sympathies  keen.  He  drew  nearer, 
saying  almost  in  a  whisper :  "  But  Uncle  Billy 
says  you  fought  a  good  fight  while  you  was 
gettin'  ready  to  help  us  cul'ud  folks,  an'  if 
you  got  so  knocked  up  you  can't  do  nothin' 
moah,  maybe  'twon't  be  expected  as  you  should 
have  yo'  hands  full  when  you  go  through  the 
gates.  You've  got  yo'  scars  to  show  for  what 
you've  done." 

George  lifted  up  his  head.  There  was  an 
eager  light  in  his  eyes,  not  so  much  because  of 
the  comfort  that  had  come  from  such  an  unex- 
pected quarter,  as  because  of  a  new  hope  that 
the  words  suggested.  He  lifted  the  boy's  chin 
with  a  trembling  hand,  and  looked  wistfully  into 
his  eyes. 

"  You  could  do  it,  couldn't  you  ? "  he  asked. 
"  All  that  I  must  leave  undone  ?  The  struggle 
would  not  be  so  great  for  you.  There  are 
schools  near  at  hand  now.  You  would  not 
have  the  fearful  odds  to  contend  with  that  I 
had.  Will  you  take  up  my  battle?  Shall 


OLE    MAMMY  S    TORMENT. 


ID/ 


I  leave  you  my  sword,  John  Jay  ?  Oh,  you 
do  understand  me,  don't  you  ? "  he  cried,  im- 
ploringly. 

"Yes,  I  understand,"  answered  the  boy. 
Then,  as  if  George  had  really  placed  an  epau- 
let upon  his  shoulder,  as  if  he  had  really  given 
him  a  sword,  he  drew  a  long  breath  and  said 
with  all  the  solemnity  of  a  promise :  "  Some 
day  Uncle  Billy  shall  say  that  about  me,  '  He 
have  fought  a  good  fight,  —  he  have  finished 
his  co'se.'  " 


IT  came  to  pass  as  George  had  said.  One 
cold,  rainy  day  when  the  wind  rustled  the  fallen 
leaves  and  sighed  through  all  the  bare  branches, 
he  came  haltingly  up  to  the  end  of  his  lonely 
pilgrimage.  It  was  given  to  little  John  Jay  to 
hold  his  hand  and  look  into  his  eyes  as  Death 
swung  up  the  bar  and  bade  him  pass  on. 

A  wondering  smile  flitted  across  the  beloved 
face  ;  then  that  mysterious  silence  that  bars  all 
sight  and  speech  fell  between  the  freed  spirit 
hastening  up  the  eternal  highway  and  the 
trembling  boy  left  sobbing  behind. 

Mars'    Nat   turned  away  with    tears    in    his 

eyes  and  looked  out  of  the  window.     "  Through 

thick  and  thin,  he's  the  one  soul  who  loved  me 

and  believed  in  me,"  he  said,  in  a  half  whisper. 

108 


OLE    MAMMY  S    TORMENT.  1 09 

"  His  poor,  black  hands  have  upheld  the  old 
family  standards  and  ideals  far  more  faithfully 
than  mine,  both  in  his  slavery  and  his  free- 
dom." 

Because  of  this  there  was  no  grave  made  for 
George  in  the  forsaken  shadow  of  Brier  Crook 
church.  He  was  given  a  place  on  the  hill,  be- 
side the  Chadwicks,  whose  name  he  had  borne 
unsullied,  and  to  whose  honor  he  had  been 
proudly  loyal. 

"That  was  a  gran'  funeral  occasion,  sis' 
Sheba,"  exclaimed  Aunt  Susan,  as  she  took 
off  the  rusty  crape  veil  that  had  served  at  the 
funerals  of  two  generations.  "  I  reckon  every 
cul'iicl  person  around  heah  was  present.  Three 
ministahs  a  helpin',  an'  fo'teen  white  families 
sendin'  flowahs  with  their  cards  on  isn't  to  be 
seen  every  day  in  the  yeah.  I  wouldn't  have 
missed  it  for  anything." 

"  No,  indeed,"  answered  Mammy,  with  a 
mournful  shake  of  the  head.  "  Dyin'  would  be 
somethin'  to  look  forwa'ds  to  if  we  could  all  hope 
for  such  a  buryin'  as  that.  But  I'm  beat  about 
John  Jay.  He  do  seem  so  onfeelin'.  He  loved 
that  man  bettah  than  anything  on  this  yearth, 
an*  I  s'posed  he'd  take  his  death  mighty  hard ; 


IIO  OLE    MAMMY  S    TORMENT. 

but  what  you  reckon  he  said  to  me  this 
mawnin'.  I  was  i'onin'  my  black  aidged  hand- 
kerchief to  take,  when  he  says  to  me,  sezee, 
1  What  you  want  to  put  on  mo'nin'  for  Rev'und 
Gawge  for  ?  He  said  to  tell  you  all  that  he  jus' 
gone  through  the  toll-gate."1 

"  You  don't  tell  me  !  "  exclaimed  Aunt  Susan. 
"  That  sut'n'ly  sounds  on-natchel  in  a  chile  like 
him." 

"  Yes,"  continued  Mammy,  "  I  haven't  seen 
him  shed  a  tear.  He  jus'  wandahs  around  the 
yard,  same  as  if  nothin'  had  happened,  and 
nevah  says 'a  word  about  it." 

She  did  not  know  how  many  times  he  slipped 
away  from  the  other  children  and  sat  alone  by 
the  church  steps,  where  he  had  so  often  lis- 
tened to  George's  vesper  melodies.  She  did 
not  know  what  mournful  cadences  of  memory 
thrilled  him,  as  he  rocked  himself  back  and 
forth  among  the  dead  weeds,  with  his  arms 
around  his  knees  and  his  head  bowed  on  them. 
She  knew  nothing  of  the  music  that  had  sung 
wordless  longings  into  his  simple  child-heart 
until  it  awakened  answering  voices  of  a  death- 
less ambition.  So  her  surprise  knew  no  bounds 
when  he  came  slowly  into  the  cabin  one  evening, 


OLE  MAMMY'S  TORMENT.  113 

and  asked  if  he  might  be  allowed  to  start 
to  school  the  following  week. 

"  Law,  chile  !  "  she  answered.  "  They  isn't 
any  school  for  cul'ud  folks  less'n  a  mile  an'  a 
half  away,  an'  besides,  you  hasn't  clothes  fitten 
to  wear.  The  scholars  would  all  laugh  at  you." 

Still  he  persisted.  "  What  put  such  a  notion 
in  yo'  head,  anyhow  ?  "  she  demanded. 

John  Jay  turned  his  face  aside,  and  busied 
himself  with  taking  another  reef  in  his  suspen- 
ders. "The  Rev'und  Gawge  wanted  me  to 
go,"  he  said,  in  a  low  tone.  "  Besides,  how  can  I 
know  what  all's  in  the  books  he  done  left  me 
'thout  I  learn  to  read?" 

"  That's  so,"  assented  Mammy,  looking 
proudly  at  the  shelves  now  ornamenting  one 
corner  of  the  little  cabin  with  George's  well- 
worn  school-books.  Most  of  the  volumes  were 
upside  down,  because  her  untutored  eyes  knew 
no  better  than  to  replace  them  so,  when  she 
took  them  out  to  dust  them  with  loving  care. 
They  were  George's  greatest  treasures,  and  she 
allowed  no  one  to  touch  them,  not  even  John 
Jay,  to  whom  they  had  been  left. 

"  What  does  a  little  niggah  like  him  want  of 
schoolin',  "  she  had  once  said  to  Uncle  Billy, 


114  OLE    MAMMY  S    TORMENT. 

when  he  had  proposed  sending  the  boy  to 
school  to  keep  him  out  of  mischief.  "Why, 
that  John  Jay  he  hasn't  got  any  mo'  mind  than 
a  grasshoppah.  All  he  knows  how  to  do  is  jus' 
to  keep  on  a  jumpin'.  No,  brer  Billy,  it  would 
be  a  pure  waste  of  good  education  to  spend  it 
on  anybody  like  him." 

John  Jay  had  always  cheerfully  agreed  with 
this  opinion,  which  she  never  hesitated  to  ex- 
press in  his  hearing.  He  had  had  no  desire 
to  give  up  his  unlettered  liberty  until  that  day 
on  the  haymow  when  he  had  his  awakening. 
Having  heard  Mammy's  opinion  so  often,  it 
was  no  wonder  that  he  kept  his  head  turned 
bashfully  aside,  and  stumbled  over  his  words 
when  he  timidly  made  his  request.  It  was 
the  sight  of  George's  books  that  gave  him 
courage  to  persist,  and  it  was  the  sight  of 
the  books  that  decided  Mammy's  answer.  She 
could  remember  the  time  when  Jintsey's  boy 
had  been  almost  as  light-headed  and  light- 
hearted  as  John  Jay;  so  it  was  not  past 
belief  that  even  John  Jay  might  settle  down 
in  time. 

The  thought  that  he  might  some  day  be 
able  to  read  the  books  that  George  had  pored 


9LE    MAMMY  5    TORMENT.  11$ 

over,  and  that,  possibly,  some  time  in  the  far 
future  he  might  be  fitted  to 'preach  the  gospel 
George  had  proclaimed,  aroused  all  her  grand- 
motherly pride.  Some  fragment  of  a  half- 
forgotten  sermon  floated  through  her  mind  as 
she  looked  on  the  ragged  little  fellow  standing 
before  her. 

"The  mantle  of  the  prophet  'Lijah  done  fell 
on  his  servant  'Lisha,"  she  muttered  under 
her  breath.  "  What  if  the  mantle  of  Gawge 
Chadwick  have  been  left  to  my  poah  Ellen's 
boy,  'long  with  them  books  ?  " 

John  Jay  was  balancing  himself  on  one  foot, 
while  he  drew  the  toes  of  the  other  along  a 
crack  in  the  floor  between  the  puncheons, 
anxiously  awaiting  her  decision.  Not  know- 
ing what  was  passing  through  her  mind,  he 
was  not  prepared  for  the  abrupt  change  in 
both  her  speech  and  manner.  He  almost  lost 
his  balance  when  she  suddenly  gave  her  consent ; 
but,  regaining  it  quickly,  he  tumbled  through 
the  door,  giving  vent  to  his  delight  in  a  series 
of  whoops  that  made  Mammy's  head  ring,  and 
brought  her  to  the  door,  scolding  crossly. 

A  few  minutes  later,  a  dusky  little  figure 
crept  through  the  gloaming,  and  rustled  softly 


n6  OLE  MAMMY'S  TORMENT. 

through  the  leaves  lying  on  the  path.  Resting 
his  arms  on  the  fence,  he  looked  across  the 
dim  fields  to  the  darkly  outlined  tree-tops  of 
the  hill  beyond. 

"  I  wondah  if  he  knows  that  I'm  keepin' 
my  promise,"  he  whispered.  "  I  wondah  if  he 
knows  I'm  tryin'  to  follow  him." 

Over  the  churchyard  hill  the  new  moon 
swung  its  slender  crescent  of  light,  and  into 
its  silvery  wake  there  trembled  out  of  the 
darkness  a  shining  star. 

The  roadside  ditches  are  covered  with  ice, 
these  cold  winter  mornings.  The  ruts  in  the 
muddy  pike  are  frozen  as  hard  as  stone.  John 
Jay  shuffles  along  in  his  big  shoes  on  his  way  to 
school,  out  at  the  toes  and  out  at  his  elbows  ;  but 
there  is  a  broad  smile  all  over  his  bright  little 
face.  Wherever  he  can  find  a  strip  of  ice  to 
slide  across,  he  goes  with  a  rush  and  a  whoop. 
Sometimes  there  is  only  a  raw  turnip  and  a 
piece  of  corn  pone  in  his  pocket  for  dinner,  j 
His  feet  and  fingers  are  always  numb  witht' 
cold  by  the  time  he  reaches  the  school  house, 
but  his  eyes  still  shine,  and  his  whistle  never 
loses  its  note  of  cheeriness. 


OLE    MAMMY  S    TORMENT.  I  I/ 

There  are  whippings  and  scoldings  in  the 
schoolhouse,  just  a's  there  have  always  been 
whippings  and  scoldings  in  the  cabin;  for  no 
sooner  is  he  thawed  out  after  his  long  walk, 
than  he  begins  to  be  the  worry  of  his  teacher's 
life,  as  he  was  the  torment  of  Mammy's.  It 
is  not  that  he  means  to  make  trouble.  De- 
spite his  many  blunders  into  mischief,  he  is 
always  at  the  head  of  his  class,  for  he  has  a 
motive  for  hard  study  that  the  other  pupils 
know  nothing  of. 

Every  evening  Bud  and  Ivy  watch  for  his 
home-coming  with  eager  faces  flattened  against 
the  cabin  window,  lit  up  by  the  red  glare 
of  the  sunset.  They  see  him  come  run- 
ning up  the  road,  snapping  his  cold  fingers, 
and  turning  occasional  handsprings  into  the 
snow-drifts  in  the  fence  corners. 

Just  before  he  comes  whistling  up  the  path 
with  his  face  twisted  into  all  sorts  of  ugly 
grimaces  to  make  them  laugh,  he  stops  at  the 
gate  a  moment.  Do  they  wonder  what  he 
always  sees  across  those  snowy  fields,  as  he 
stands  and  looks  away  towards  Mars'  Nat's 
cottage  and  the  white  churchyard  on  the 
hill  ? 


u8 


OLt    MAMMY  S    TORMENT. 


Ah,  Bud  and  Ivy  have  not  had  their  awak 
ening ;  but  the  little  brother  and  sister  are 
not  the  only  ones  who  fail  to  see  more  than 
the  surface  of  John  Jay's  nature.  Under  the 
bubbles  of  his  gay  animal  spirits  runs  the 
deep  current  of  a  strong  purpose,  and  in  these 
moments  he  is  keeping  silent  tryst  with  a 
memory.  He  thinks  of  his  promise,  and  his 
heart  goes  out  to  his  Reverend  George  on 
the  other  side  of  the  toll-gate. 


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A  Christmas  Story.  By  LOUISA  DE  LA  RAME  (OuiDA).  i  vol., 
.)}uare  I2mo,  cloth,  gilt  top,  $1.2$. 

i  new  edition  of  a  beautiful  Christmas  story  already  prized  as  a  classic  by  all  who 
know  it.  Contains  forty-two  original  illustrations  and  a  photo-gelatine  repro- 
duction of  Rubens's  great  picture,  "  The  Descent  from  the  Cross." 

The  Niirnberg  Stove. 

By  LOUISA  DE  LA  RAME  (OuiDA).  i  vol.,  square  I2mo,  cloth, 
gilt  top,  $1.25. 

Another  of  Ouida's  charming  stories,  delightful  alike  to  old  and  young.  With  fifty 
original  illustrations  and  a  color  frontispiece  of  a  German  stove  after  the  cele- 
brated potter,  Hirschvogel. 

An  Archer  with  Columbus. 

By  CHARLES  E.  BRIMBLECOM.  With  about  fifty  illustrations 
from  original  pen-and-ink  sketches,  i  vol.,  i6mo,  handsome  cloth 
binding,  $1.00. 

A  capital  story  of  a  boy  who  attracted  the  attention  of  Columbus  while  he  was  seek- 
ing the  aid  of  Ferdinand  and  Isabella  for  his  great  voyage  of  discovery.  The  wit 
and  courage  of  the  boy  enabled  him  to  be  of  service  to  the  great  explorer,  and  he 
served  as  an  arcluer  on  the  vessel  of  Columbus.  His  loyalty  and  devotion,  through 
vicissitude  and  danger,  endeared  him  to  his  master,  and  the  story  of  his  experiences 
and  exploits  will  make  him  a  favorite  with  the  boys,  young  and  old.  The  story  is 
well  told,  crisply  written,  full  of  reasonable  adventure  and  lively  dialogue,  without 
a  tedious  page  from  beginning  to  end. 

Timothy  Dole. 

By  JUNIATA  SALSBURY.  With  twenty-five  or  thirty  illustrations 
from  drawings  and  pen-and-ink  sketches,  i  vol.,  i6mo,  fancy  cloth, 

$1.25. 

The  title  gives  no  clue  to  the  character  of  the  book,  but  the  reader  who  begins  the 
first  chapter  will  not  stop  until  he  has  finished  the  whole.  The  youthful  hero,  and 
a  genuine  hero  he  proves  to  be,  starts  from  home,  loses  his  way,  meets  with  start- 
ling adventures,  finds  friends,  kind  and  many,  grows  to  be  a  manly  man,  and  is 
able  to  devote  himself  to  bettering  the  condition  of  the  poor  in  the  mining  region 
of  Pennsylvania,  the  scene  of  his  early  life  and  adventures.  The  book  is  not  of 
the  goody-goody  order ;  although  written  with  a  purpose,  and  conveying  a  moral 
lesson,  this  feature  is  not  obtrusive.  It  is  a  wholesome  and' vigorous  book  that 
boys  and  girls,  and  parents  as  well,  will  read  and  enjoy. 

Bebee :  or,  Two  Little  Wooden  Shoes. 

By  LOUISA  DE  LA  RAME  (OuiDA).     With  fifty  illustrations,  and 
a  photo-gelatine  frontispiece  from  original  drawings  by  Etheldred  B. 
Barry.     I  vol.,  square  I2mo.,  cloth,  gilt  top,  $1.25. 
A  new  and  dainty  edition  of  Ouida's  most  exquisite  and  touching  story. 

Published  by   L.  C.  PAGE  AND  COMPANY, 
196  Summer  St.,  Boston,  Mass. 


Books  for  Boys  and  Girls. 

The  Young  Pearl  Divers. 

A  story  of  Australian  adventure  by  land  and  sea.  By  LIEUT.  H 
PHELPS  WHITMARSH.  Author  of  "The  Mysterious  Voyage  of  tht 
Daphne,"  etc.  i  vol.,  cloth,  I2mo,  illustrated,  $1.25. 

Tliis  is  a  splendid  story  for  boys,  by  an  author  who  writes  in  vigorous  and  interest- 
ing language  of  scenes  and  adventures  with  which  he  is  personally  acquainted. 

The  book  is  illustrated  with  twelve  full-page  half-tones  by  H.  Burgess,  whose 
drawings  have  exactly  caught  the  spirited  tone  of  the  narrative. 

Feats  On  The  Fiord. 

By  HARRIET  MARTINEAU.  A  tale  of  Norwegian  life,  with  about 
sixty  original  illustrations  and  a  colored  frontispiece.  I  vol.,  small 
quarto,  cloth,  gilt  top,  $1.25. 

This  admirable  book,  read  and  enjoyed  by  so  many  young  people  a  generation  ago 
and  now  partially  forgotten,  deserves  to  be  brought  to  the  attention  of  parents  in 
search  of  wholesome  reading  for  their  children  to-day.  It  is  something  more  than  a 
juvenile  book,  being  really  one  of  the  most  instructive  books  about  Norway  and 
Norwegian  life  and  manners  ever  written,  well  deserving  liberal  illustration  and 
the  luxury  of  good  paper  now  given  to  it. 

The  Fairy  Folk  of  Blue  Hill. 

A  story  of  folk-lore  by  LILY  JP*.  WESSELHOEFT,  author  of 
"  Sparrow  the  Tramp,"  etc.,  with  fifty-five  illustrations  from  original 
drawings  by  Alfred  C.  Eastman.  i  vol.,  i6mo,  fancy  cloth,  $1.25. 

A  new  volume  by  MRS.  WESSELHOEFT,  well  known  as  one  of  our  best  writers  for 
the  young,  and  who  has  made  a  host  of  friends  among  the  young  people  who  have 
read  her  delightful  books.  This  book  ought  to  interest  and  appeal  to  every  child 
who  has  read  her  earlier  books. 

Miss  Gray's   Girls;  or,  Summer  Days  in  the  Scottish 
Highlands. 

By  JEANNETTE  A.  GRANT.  With  about  sixty  illustrations  in  half- 
tone and  pen-and-ink  sketches  of  Scottish  scenery,  i  vol.,  smal7 
quarto,  cloth  and  ornamental  side,  $1.50. 

A  pleasantly  told  story  of  a  summer  trip  through  Scotland,  somewhat  out  of  the 
beaten  track.  A  teacher,  starting  at  Glasgow,  takes  a  lively  party  of  girls,  her 
pupils,  through  the  Trossachs  to  Oban,  through  the  Caledonian  Canal  to  Inver- 
ness, and  as  far  north  as  l^rora,  missing  no  part  of  the  matchless  scenery  and  no 
place  of  historic  interest.  Returning  through  Perth,  Stirling,  Edinburgh,  Melrose, 
and  Abbotsford,  the  enjoyment  of  the  party  and  the  interest  of  the  reader  never 
lag.  With  all  the  sightseeing,  not  the  least  interesting  features  of  the  book  are 
the  glimpses  of  Scottish  home  life  which  the  party  from  time  to  time  are  fortunsia 
enough  to  be  able  to  enjoy  through  the  kindly  hospitality  of  friends. 

Published  by   L.  C.  PAGE  AND  COMPANY, 
196  Summer  St.,  Boston,  Mass. 


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